


The Angel's Curse

by addict_with_a_pen



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Aziraphale x Crowley - Freeform, Fluff, M/M, Mild Trigger warning, Plot, Raphael!Crowley, angel x demon, aziraphale - Freeform, crowley - Freeform, crowley x aziraphale, curse, demon x angel, gomens, gomens fanfic, good omens - Freeform, good omens fanfic, good omens shipfic, ineffable husbands, shipfic, the angel’s curse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-18
Updated: 2019-09-26
Packaged: 2020-05-14 10:28:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 19,230
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19271389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/addict_with_a_pen/pseuds/addict_with_a_pen
Summary: 𝘖𝘩, 𝘔𝘳 𝘊𝘳𝘰𝘸𝘭𝘦𝘺, 𝘸𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘸𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘥𝘰𝘸𝘯 𝘪𝘯 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘩𝘦𝘢𝘥?In a certain little bookshop nestled on a street in Soho, something is amiss with a certain ethereal sushi-lover. Being served to our favorite hip-swishing smooth-talking mess of a demon is an appetizer  of catty demoness with a passion for chaos, an entrée featuring a Hellishly evil plan to clip the wings of all the angels, and a cold dish of apparent betrayal with whipped cream and a cherry on top for dessert. Better get a good bottle of chardonnay, Crowley, you're gonna need it for this one.*Good Omens and all associated characters featured in this work are owned by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett





	1. Bookshop part 1

**Author's Note:**

> hey guys, this is my first ao3 work, as well as my first Good Omens fic. I used to publish on wattpad but decided ao3 would be better. I'm gonna try to incorporate as much from the book as i can, only tweaking if necessary. Tell me what you think! I take commissions, too!

"One sugar or two, dear?" Aziraphale asked.

"Two, if you please," Crowley called back from where his lanky form was draped over a faded armchair in the front of Aziraphale's bookshop. He held a potted plant above his head, inches from his face, inspecting it with a critical eye. His startlingly intense golden eyes were squinted with suspicion, scrutinizing every last aspect of the thing. (His sunglasses lay on the counter where Aziraphale bustled about, making tea.) The demon was deciding whether or not the green-leaved shrub would make the cut.

The plant in question, a lily shoot, was green-leaved and proudly erect, but had yet to produce any blooms.

After a few more moments of careful deliberation, Crowley decided to allow the lilies to live--for now. Perhaps he had developed a warmth for it, seeing as its vivid green presence considerably brightened up the dull and murky bookshop. Which was oddly reversed, when Crowley thought about it.

The dank, if cozy, little bookshop belonged to the angel, and angels were supposed to represent light, purity, warmth. All the nice things, such as cake and kindness and compassion and Freddie Mercury. Good things.

Meanwhile, the shop was poorly lit, dusty, quite dirty, and smelt vaguely of old mothballs. Crowley knew that it was--pardon the term--heaven to some, but to him it was simply boring, bordering on depressing. Also, rather asthma-attack inducing.

Then there was the plant, being all bright and lively and happy, which belonged to Crowley.

Crowley, the demon from Perdition.

Crowley, who was supposed to represent the evil and the hatred and the all the horrible nasties of the world, things like murderers and monsters and people who put pineapple on pizza. Bad things.

That seemed a bit backwards to him, but perhaps he was thinking too much. Besides, there was no good or bad, right? Just two sides to the same war.

That's what he told himself, anyway.

He turned the pot slowly in his hands, admiring the glossy sheen of the lily's leaves in the muddled candlelight.

Not to say that Aziraphale, as an angel, didn't successfully represent the light, the purity, and the warmth. In fact, Crowley thought of his holier counterpart as the very personification of light, purity, and warmth.

Hell, whatever room that Aziraphale walked into would brighten a little bit upon the angel's arrival. The temperature would seem to rise a few degrees, but just so that it felt like a warm blanket or a cup of cocoa. Additionally, the air would thin to where Crowley would become overly aware of his own breathing and attempt to quiet it for fear that Aziraphale would hear.

In many ways, he's like the lily, isn't he? Crowley thought, smiling gently to himself. Guess that makes me the wretched old bookshop. On my own, i'm a dark and broody thing, but with a lily, i can be absolutely—

"Radiant," said Aziraphale, startling the demon out of his thoughts.

Crowley started guiltily and nearly dropped the lilies onto his own face as he saw the angel watching him from behind the counter, two steaming cups of tea on a tray beside his hand and a gleam of amusement twinkling in his eye.

“Wha-huh?" Crowley said, flustered, as he attempted to regain his composure.

Aziraphale smiled pleasantly at the blushing demon, who manoeuvered himself into a proper sitting position in the armchair. He crossed his legs self-consciously and tried to look cool, hyper-aware of the angel’s gaze.

"Radiant," Azi repeated, "that little grin of yours that plays across your face when you think no one’s looking.”

Crowley blushed harder.

“Iyyyyyuh i don’t know what you, erm, what you’re talking about...” he said half heartedly, rubbing the back of his neck. With a quick, discreet gesture he conjured a new pair of sunglasses to hide behind.

He heard Aziraphale chuckle lightly as the angel approached carrying the tea tray.

He offered Crowley one of the cups.

As the demon reached up, Aziraphale extended his own hand towards Crowley’s face.

“What are you...” His voice trailed off as the sunglasses were removed, gently, from his eyes. Suddenly it was very hard to breathe.

“You know, dear,” Aziraphale began quietly, examining the sunglasses, “I do wish you wouldn’t wear these so often.”

His soft blue gaze caught Crowley’s, and pinned it not unlike how a hawk would a struggling rabbit.

Only, this rabbit had no desire to escape.

“Why?” asked the demon as he returned the stare, mesmerized.

“Because i never get to see your eyes.” Aziraphale reached down once more, and with a perfectly manicured hand tilted Crowley’s chin upwards, so that the candlelight caught in those fiery yellow-gold eyes.

“You’ve always had such beautiful eyes,” continued Aziraphale. “Even before your Fall.”

Crowley winced. He didn’t like to talk about his demotion from angel to demon. He’d thought Aziraphale had known that.

Something was wrong.

“Aziraphale, are you drunk?” he asked.

The angel smiled. “Only on you, love.”

Crowley opened his mouth again, to ask something along the lines of “Are you mad?”

The angel struck like a snake, quickly and without warning, leaving no time for his prey to react.

He leaned forward, lifting the demon’s face even further upwards and drawing him in. Aziraphale bent his head and placed his lips on Crowley’s, which were already slightly parted in preparation to question Aziraphale’s sanity.

Aziraphale felt Crowley’s intake of breath and watched as his golden eyes fell closed, one of very few times he had ever seen them do so. Crowley didn’t blink much.

There was a  _ fahwhooshing _ sound as powerful black-feathered wings exploded out of the demon’s trim black suit and beat the air a single time. Then they lowered slowly, curling gently to cuff the angel’s shoulder.

He closed his own eyes and allowed his pristine white wings to break free of the restricting coat, extending around the two of them to form a cocoon of sleek feathers. One pair of wings was neatly groomed and preened while the other had seen better days, but both were stunningly beautiful in themselves.

Crowley had been taken by surprise, obviously. But he wasn’t complaining.

 

 


	2. Bookshop, Part Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you all for reading! Please let me know in the comments what you thought or if there are any mistakes!

The demon was known for being able to do very weird things with his tongue, and here was a prime example. 

Crowley lost all awareness of the outside world. Stars seemed to shine on the backs of his eyelids, and he lost all footing on reality.  He forgot where he was, he forgot  _ who  _ he was, and he couldn't have told you if it was day or night in that moment, if he was awake or dreaming, and for several reasons: one being the only thing that was  _ real  _ was the angel just then; another being it would have been fairly difficult to get the words out, considering his mouth was full of Aziraphale's. 

Crowley didn't know where he ended and Aziraphale began, all he knew was those soft lips on his, the feeling of those holy hands on his face… 

His tongue darted out, flicking along the edges of Aziraphale’s mouth. Then it slipped inside, tracing the inside of the angel’s upper lip. He felt Azi’s own tongue meet his and toy with it gently. 

Crowley shivered, and in his excitement beat the air with his wings a few times more. Books and loose papers flew about the room, and he dimly realized he was making a mess. He pulled away embarrasedly, and stood up to clean the errant papers. Too late he noticed the forgotten plant still in his lap, and the pot shattered on the floor. 

“Oh for the love of Go-Sa- _ someone!”  _ The demon blushed harder than ever as he began to scrape together the shards of hardened clay. Aziraphale grinned amusedly before placing a hand on Crowley’s shoulder. The angel saw that his pupils, usually thin slits in the centre of his eyes, had dilated like a cat’s into big, round black discs.

“It’s alright, Crowley, dear. It’s no big deal. Why don’t you go and get the dustpan, it’s in the back room.”

The demon gave him a wide-eyed apologetic look, saying “Er, yes, of course, I-I’ll get that, then,” stumbling over the word ‘I’ll’ as his foot caught on a thick leatherbound book and he lost his balance for a moment. He disappeared, tucking his wings back into his suit as he did so to avoid knocking things over. 

Aziraphale’s gaze trailed after him, an odd gleam in his eye. He smiled to himself as he bent over, mindful of his own wings, and began to pick up the larger pieces. 

A lot of them were quite sharp, he noticed. They would have to make sure to be very thorough, to avoid one of the shards ending up in someone’s foot. That would be--

Suddenly Aziraphale’s mind blanked. He couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, couldn’t think, couldn’t  _ breathe.  _ He fought it for a moment, then succumbed to the tidal wave of darkness that had washed over him. 

*************************************************************************************************************

Crowley emerged from the back room, dustpan in hand, to see Aziraphale kneeling in the pile of dirt and broken clay. He didn’t see the red at first. 

“Angel?”

Azi didn’t answer. But as Crowley approached, he could see something bright red staining the angel’s coat. He appeared to be holding his left wrist, where most of the blood seemed to be coming from. 

“Aziraphale!” Crowley dropped the pan and rushed to the angel’s side. He now saw that Azi wasn’t holding his wrist, but a bloody, wickedly sharp piece of pot. 

And had sunk the shard into the soft flesh of his own arm. 

Aziraphale was staring vacantly at the wound he’d made, seemingly not registering anything. He showed no signs of pain, or any awareness of knowing what he was doing at all. 

Blood dribbled, then dripped, then flowed freely down in a steady stream as he held the shard in the opening, applying a gentle but firm pressure to continue pushing the piece of clay further into himself. 

“Aziraphale, what the  _ bloody hell _ are you doing?!?!?” cried Crowley, grabbing the angel’s arm holding the shard and wrenching it away. 

At Crowley’s touch, Aziraphale seemed to snap out of it. He started, blinking up at Crowley, whose golden eyes were narrowed and filled with worry. Then he looked down and saw the blood welling from the gash in his arm. His gaze flitted to the clay shard in his hand, covered in red, and understanding dawned on his face. 

“I—oh dear me, i don’t know what came over me, one minute everything was fine and the next here i am, oh my,  Crowley—” His eyes met the demon’s once more, wide and scared. 

He slumped to the side, his face pale. Crowley caught him, and lifted the angel up into his arms and carried him to a sofa. 

“Alright, angel, we’ll figure this out later, for now we need to get you patched up.” Crowley looked around feverishly, realizing he had no idea what to do.  “Err…” 

He saw a lacy cloth lying on a table, and grabbed that. “Got to stop the blood flow, i suppose…”

He had just begun to fold the cloth to form a crude tourniquet when Aziraphale waved him away. 

“It’s alright, Crowley, I can just…” the angel screwed up his face in pained concentration. The blood kept on flowing. 

“Can just what, angel?” Crowley gave him a dubious look. 

“Can just… _ what? _ ” Aziraphale opened his eyes. Confusion and terror made themselves at home on his ever-paling face. “I don’t understand…”

Crowley frowned with concern and tied the tourniquet above the gash, just below his elbow.  _ Between the wound and the heart,  _ he thought. 

“Understand what, Aziraphale?” Then it hit him. “You can’t..?"

Aziraphale shook his head slowly. “I can’t heal myself.” His breathing began to grow heavier as his mortal body lost its oxygen-rich blood, even as the bleeding slowed with the application of the tourniquet. 

He made a gesture towards the bits of shattered pot, dirt, and lily that still lay on the ground, much of it soaked in blood. Nothing happened. 

“That should have...should have…” Aziraphale panted, then fainted into the couch. 

_ Should have taken care of the mess,  _ thought Crowley, making the same gesture and watching the dirt and plant replacing themselves in the newly reconstructed pot, as well as the bloodstains disappearing.  _ He could’ve done that from the start. So why’d he send me to get the dustpan?  _

_ Doesn’t matter,  _ he cut himself off.  _ Point is, he  _ can’t  _ do it now, what the hell is up with that?  _

Once again, a sense of dread crept over the edges of his mind. Something was wrong, alright. Something was very,  _ very  _ wrong. 


	3. The Dreamer

_"How much longer?" hisses a voice, sounding unpleasantly like damp leaves being scrunched in a fist. The question is asked with an impatient edge, and it is obvious that it has been asked before. It is also obvious that the voice's owner is growing rather unwilling to continue to ask._

_"Soon, soon," replies a second voice, with a hint of annoyance. It is a delicate feminine voice, but contains shards of ice and broken glass hidden below the breezy surface. It is a dangerous voice, one that speaks quietly of inflicting a very long, very painful death upon the one who crossed her._

_The first voice mutters something unintelligible, but falls silent afterwards._

_After a while, the second voice murmurs, with a hint of excitement, “It’s working. The spell has begun to corrode him away like acid on metal.”_

_There is a pause, then the woman speaks again, and the wicked grin on her face can be heard through her words: “It is only a matter of time til he is ours.”_

_Before who is yours, wonders the dreamer idly._

_He is dimly aware of a certain sense of danger, but fails to make any connections between the voices and the uneasiness growing in the back of his foggy, swamped mind._

_There is something wrong, the dreamer hazily decides._

_Something wrong…_

_The dreamer slip back into nothingness, the void like a cloak that presses in on all sides, gently smothering its victim with its velvet weight._

* * *

_“Aziraphale?”_

_Yet another voice, this one masculine. It is low and smoky, giving the impression of a fiercely crackling flame, like a campfire deep in the woods, while still being as soft and as smooth as the finest Chinese silks. However, it has a certain… snakelike quality, with the faintest hint of a gentle hiss at its edges._

_It is a very familiar voice, thinks the dreamer._

_“Aziraphale, please,” implores the unseen man. There is a rising note of panic in his voice, giving his words the odd quality of seemingly being yanked upwards by their tails upon leaving his mouth._

_The voice appears to grow distant, then drift back again._

_“Oh, angel,” laments the man. “If I lose you again, I don’t know what I’ll do…”_

_Angel, that’s me, realizes the dreamer._

_Slowly but surely, the dreamer begins to grasp the urgency in the man’s voice as he continues, “Six thousand years you’ve been by my side, and even when we weren’t together, I always knew I would see you again. I never had a doubt of that._

_“I’m an optimist, me, deep down. Always have been, despite… y’know, the whole ‘sauntering vaguely downwards’ thing.”_

_His words grow heavy. The way they flow at first like a river bubbling out of a deep cave, then come crashing down like a waterfall informs the dreamer that they are being drawn from a reservoir of hidden emotion buried deep in the speaker’s heart._

_The dreamer feels a twinge in his own sleeping heart, even through the murkiness of his mind. Who_ was _this man and why did he make the dreamer feel this way?_

_Something begins to tease the edges of the dreamer’s mind. Then the man speaks again, sounding close to tears._

_“It’s always been you,” chokes the man. “Always, you’ve been what’s kept me going. I… I don’t believe in the Great Plan the way you do, angel. I don’t trod on because i think it’s all gonna work itself out in the end.” The speaker pauses, then takes a shaky breath and keeps on._

_“No, i don’t believe that. I believe in_ you. _You’re the reason i don’t give up. It’s all for you. So don’t you give up on me, angel, because you can be damn sure—”_

_Abruptly the speaker stops, leaving only the silent darkness._

_The danger is screaming now, and the dreamer finally registers it. How could he had been so daft? Even with the cloudy haze like thick spiderwebs upon his thoughts, he begins to fight the darkness._

_Wake up!! the dreamer shouts at himself. Wake up, you dithering fool, wake_ up!!!!

_Gradually the light begins to return. It is just a pinprick in the distance, but it gives the dreamer renewed strength to throw off the heavy cloak of the void that surrounds him._

_Just as the dreamer is about to break free, he hears the woman’s voice once more:_

_“Oh, our little angel is falling!” she cackles. “Falling right into our hands!”_

_And then the dream dissolves, and the dreamer is a dreamer no longer._

 


	4. Temptation, part One

“Aziraphale?” Crowley sat down on the arm of a chair within arm’s distance of the sofa upon which the unconscious angel lay.

“Aziraphale, please,” he breathed, gazing worriedly at him. Exactly _what_ he was pleading for was beyond him, but he expected it was along the lines of “please wake up because i’m kind of worried you won’t and i don’t want to think about that.”

“Oh, angel,” murmured Crowley, recalling the last time he’d thought Aziraphale was gone.

Absently, he got up and retrieved an ugly but warm tartan blanket and covered the sleeping angel with it. “If i lose you again, i don’t know what i’ll do…” He ran a hand through his rusty ginger hair, sitting back down on the chair’s arm. His gaze settled on something far, far away.

“Six thousand years you’ve been by my side, and even when we weren’t together, i always knew i would see you again. I never had a doubt of that.

“I’m an optimist, me,” Crowley continued, smiling humorlessly. It wasn’t so much a smile as a grimace. “Always have been, deep down. Despite, yknow… the whole ‘sauntering vaguely downwards’ thing.”

His voice grew tight, but he soldiered on. He _had_ to get this out, and even if he’d wanted to stop, he couldn’t have. It poured out of him now, in a flood of words that all but drowned him.

His eyes fell upon the angel. Tentatively, Crowley reached out, then hesitated. He teetered on the edge of indecision, then tipped.

He took Aziraphale’s limp hand in his own, startled by how cold it felt. He closed his eyes and focused on channeling some of his own heat into the angel. Gradually, Aziraphale’s hand began to warm up.

Crowley held his angel’s hand in silence for a few moments longer, then succumbed to the tide once more. “It’s always been you,” he said quietly. “Always, you’ve been what’s kept me going. I…” He paused, noticing the bloodstain spreading on the cloth he’d used to cover the wound in Aziraphale’s arm, tied clumsily below the tourniquet. The cut had begun to bleed again.

He set Azi’s hand down gingerly, and gave the tourniquet a gentle tug to tighten the knot. He did the same to the makeshift bandage, then took the angel’s hand once more.

“I don’t believe in the Great Plan the same way you do, angel. I don’t trod on because i think it’s all gonna work itself out in the end. I tell myself that’s why, but...” Crowley stared at the bloodstain, which had ceased growing, and took a shaky breath to continue. “No, I don’t believe that. I believe in _you.”_ He gave Azi’s hand a squeeze. “ _You’re_ the reason i don’t give up. It’s all for you.” He sniffed, hoping that somehow, the angel could hear his words. “So don’t you give up on me, because you can be _damn sure—”_

Suddenly the door to the shop banged open, the ‘CLOSED’ sign swinging wildly.

Crowley dropped Aziraphale’s hand and stood up, automatically using himself to shield the sleeping angel from whoever had just entered the shop.

“We’re closed!” he called, craning his neck to see who the intruder was. “Wasn’t the bloody door locked?” he murmured to himself, taking a step towards the entrance. “Who’s there— _nngh!”_

The next thing he saw was a flash of orange as something huge crashed into him, knocking him sideways to the ground. He managed to avoid landing on Aziraphale, but as he twisted, he struck his head hard on the corner of the chair whose arm he’d been sitting on before the unknown person had come into the shop.

The blanket he’d laid over Aziraphale came down over his head, even though he didn’t think he’d caught the edge of it as he fell, but in that moment he was too dazed to be sure of anything.

He slumped against the legs of the chair as whole galaxies exploded in front of his eyes. He frantically blinked them away, trying to focus through the cloud of pain that had descended on him because the danger had not yet passed.

“Aaaaaggh…” he groaned, forcing himself to sit up. His head pulsed with each beat of his heart as he pulled the blanket off, but the too-quick movement unbalanced him and he slipped sideways, now lying flat on his back.

Almost immediately, Crowley felt a weight pressing down hard on his chest, accompanied by four sharp pricks that appeared to be claws sinking into his skin and shredding holes in the fabric of his shirt. His vision finally cleared enough to show him what he was dealing with, and he knew instinctively that he had mere seconds to think of something.

He did the first thing that came to him. He screwed his eyes shut and concentrated.

It was not a moment too soon. A set of jaws equipped with large, razor-sharp teeth snapped shut on empty air where Crowley’s human throat had been only moments before. He shot out from beneath his attacker like a bullet from a rifle as she growled in annoyance; the deep, menacing sound was straight out of a nightmare. Her huge teeth gleamed white as she bared them at him.

Crowley reared up, showing his own impressive fangs and hissing violently. His golden eyes blazed ferociously. He quickly sized up his opponent, and, upon seeing that she was preparing to fly at him again, hastily decided that he was more than half her size and could take her. He coiled in anticipation of her attack, ready.

As the massive tigress leapt forward, Crowley struck. He threw himself up into the air to meet the tigress midway, but he’d gone a little higher and a little to the side so that he passed her. As he sailed past her muzzle, he noted with satisfaction the surprise in her glaring green eyes. He also saw the scar over her right eye that extended in a vertical slash from her brow halfway down the side of her face.

 _She’s gonna have another scar to worry about in a minute,_ he thought with some smugness, then he turned his head and sank his fangs into her neck.

The tigress yowled and twisted, batting at Crowley with powerful taloned paws, but couldn’t shake him off. The energy of the serpent’s leap combined with his weight flying in the opposite direction of her yanked the tigress back and away from Aziraphale. She landed on her side, nearly crushing Crowley, but was on her feet in an instant.

She let out a furious roar that rattled the windows, shaking her body violently in an effort to dislodge him.

While he may have gotten Aziraphale out of harm’s way, Crowley was still very much in danger.

He held on for dear life, whipping his tail back and forth to try and tear deeper into her neck. Too late he realized that this was a mistake.

As his tail passed her face, the tigress saw the opportunity and went for it. She lunged, snatching a mouthful of the back end of Crowley’s body and clamping down _hard._

Scales bent and flaked off*, and blood gushed from two deep holes made by her incisors.

Crowley screamed. It was something like a human scream mixed with a reptilian screech, deep-throated and staticky. He released the tigress, who whirled around and went for his throat with her claws.

She dropped his all-but-shredded tail and slammed his head down against the floor, licking at the blood that now stained her mouth. Crowley’s blood.

The tigress had him pinned. There was nowhere for him to go.

Crowley stared up defiantly, panting. Then, for no apparent reason, he decided to morph back into human form.

His mangled back end manifested as his left leg. It was only a flesh wound, but it was deep, and wide. It flamed like anything, and Crowley felt like screaming again, but he only gritted his teeth and hissed. And waited.

The tigress’ claws dug into his throat, tiny beads of blood appearing at their tips, but she didn’t finish it. Instead, her entire body rippled.

Just as he’d hoped, his own transformation had prompted her to reveal her own human form. Crowley watched coldly as the tigress’ body shrank and reshaped into… _sweet baby freddie mercury**—!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *I have no idea how snake scales work  
> **Don’t use the lord’s name in vain!! :)


	5. Temptation: Part Two

The demoness’ black-gelled claw-shaped nails dug into the flesh of Crowley’s wrists, but he hardly noticed. He was too stunned by the woman who pinned him against the ground in such a powerful feline stance. 

She was lean but had a muscular build, easily stronger than Crowley. In addition to her blazing green eyes with slitted catlike pupils and sharp nails, a few other things reminded him of her demonic animal shape. She had short jet-black hair dyed a brilliant orange at the tips swept back in a punk-style lion’s mane and spiked up in the back. A chain ear cuff dangled from one ear, clinking quietly against simple black bar drop earrings. Around her neck was a black lace choker. She wore winged black eyeliner and a deep red eyeshadow, accompanied by matching bloodred lipstick that blended with the blood smeared on her bared teeth.

She wore quite a statement-making outfit. Everything about her screamed _rebel._ A red flannel shirt hung unbuttoned on her shoulders, over a plain black tank top tucked into--yup, you guessed it--a ripped pair of black washed-out jeans. A mean-looking pair of worn heeled leather combat boots completed the look with its chrome studs and scuffed edges. 

Crowley always thought of his style belonging to the music of the 70s. To him, nothing would ever top Queen or Black Sabbath, or the Velvet Underground for that matter, and he tended to reflect that in his clothing. This woman was obviously of a similar mindset.

Only instead of Queen, she screamed of the aggressive and anarchist style displayed by bands of the 90s and early 2000s like Green Day, My Chemical Romance, Interpol, and blink-182. Crowley remembered when artists like them had broken through, and although they clearly had skill when it came to guitars and such, they had been a bit too intense for him. Too _bold._

There was bold, and then there was _bold._ He considered himself to be of the former kind of bold, giving his absolute best efforts to do what needed to be done but trying to be at least a little flexible about it. She clearly was of the latter, allowing no one to stand in her way and going to insane lengths to achieve her goals. The way she sneered down at him, the wild, manic light of fight in her eyes... it all told Crowley she _craved_ this kind of thing. To _fight,_ and to come out on _top…_ it was a fire raging in her blood.

Hell probably loved her. 

“ _So,_ ” she smirked as her tigress’ tail waved nonchalantly once before disappearing. “The infamous _Crawly_ at last.” Her voice was deep for a woman but it suited her incredibly well. It sounded like the purr of a finely tuned motorbike’s engine. He found himself lulled by it, and kicked himself mentally for it.

However, at the sound of his old name, which he detested, he was pleased to feel a spark of hatred towards her. “It’s _Crowley,_ ” he hissed through bared teeth. 

The woman only smirked wider. “Whatever, serpent.” She ran her tongue over the blood on her teeth, appearing to enjoy the taste.

Crowley shuddered involuntarily, blaming it on the blood loss. He felt a bit woozy, now that he considered it. The beginnings of what promised to be quite a spectacular headache stewed in the back of his brain. He ignored it for now.

“And you are?” he managed. Between the fire in his leg, the growing lightheadedness, and the seemingly hypnotic effect the strange demoness had on him, he was finding it increasingly hard to keep his thoughts straight. Or rather, keep his thoughts _not_ straight. 

Alright, he’d just confused himself.

The demoness’ mesmerizing eyes glinted. Crowley winced as her sharp nails began to draw blood from his wrists. He both vaguely wished she would release him and somewhat less vaguely hoped that she wouldn’t. He didn’t quite know why that was, and his mind was too foggy to puzzle out why he felt guilty for it either.

“Vanessa, esteemed agent of Hell,” she said with a little flourish. “But you can call me Essie if you’d like.” She gave a little laugh as if she knew something he didn’t, tossing her head to blow a piece of flaming orange hair out of her eye. “It won’t matter soon anyway.”

 _W_ _on’t matter…?_ he thought. What on earth did _that_ mean? 

“And I expect I’m in trouble Down Below, _Essie?_ ” He spat her name with as much venom as he could without actually spraying venom from his fangs. _Not that I’m ever_ not _in trouble,_ he added silently, somewhat bitterly.

She grinned slyly, her eyes boring holes into Crowley’s. He fought the urge to look away. 

“Enough talking, _Crowley_ ,” Essie purred, and before the demon could ask for clarification as to what exactly she meant by that, she lunged downwards.

Crowley screwed his eyes shut, bracing to feel her sharp teeth tearing his throat open, but that didn’t happen. Instead, he felt something soft and warm on his lips. 

_She was kissing him!_

His arms had been pinned above his head by her powerful hands, but now they released him to grab at Crowley’s face. His eyes flew open in shock, but to his dismay he found that he could not break away. In fact, he didn’t _want_ to. His snakelike eyes slid downwards and closed almost all the way. It felt good, the way the demoness kissed him. She was _aggressive, dominant,_ taking _control of him…_

And Crowley found himself liking that. Something screamed in the back of his mind, something about how very wrong what he was doing was, something about how he was being tricked, or something... _something about Aziraphale!_ But his thoughts kept slipping away from the angel on the couch, the angel that he should be protecting right now and was doing a miserable job of it, like how water slides off… off… whatever it-- _ducks!--_ and all he could focus on, or at least be aware of was the demoness, her warm hands, oh that’s quite an impressive tattoo of a tiger-- _tigress,_ female--on her forearm, and damn she smelled fantastically like gunpowder and rose petals and--

He felt Essie’s tongue slip beneath his, rubbing the bottom of his jaw while her hands drew him in like a tide. He was barely aware of the throbbing in his leg anymore, as he lifted his own hands, placing one on the small of her back, the other curling around her neck and pulling her downwards, onto him. This was new, and it was _good._

Then, just as Crowley began to sink into the waves of her body, to lose himself in her, to _explore_ her, something clicked into place in his brain. _You IDIOT!_ he shouted at himself, horrified. But it was too late; Essie had already done the deed. He could feel his already-swampy mind growing even murkier as her black magic worked its, well, magic. He fought it with everything he had, because he knew that if he let her spell win, Aziraphale would be all alone and vulnerable. 

 _Fight, you worthless slut of a demon, FIGHT IT!!_ he cried internally. But all of a sudden he couldn’t remember what he was supposed to be fighting. Surely it wasn’t this supernatural, godlike creature pressed against him, not when what she was doing felt so _good._ Essie reached for the demon’s hand on her back, guiding it upwards and around to the front of her, tempting him. 

And he, not realizing what this entailed, allowed it. He felt the curve of her body, the soft, warm flesh in his hand, and allowed her to do as she pleased. All he knew was her. In that moment, he would have done _anything_ to keep her in his arms, to keep that unholy mouth on his, even if he had to _kill_ for it--

Crowley’s eyes opened ever so slightly, and his gaze happened to land on the sofa where Aziraphale-- _Aziraphale!_ Crowley’s heart stopped and the blood rushed from his face. The sight of the angel _miraculously_ cleared his mind of whatever mind-numbing spell Essie had cast on him, but despite that, he still could not think. 

A pair of light blue eyes met his. They were wide, they were awake, and they were _livid._

 


	6. An Explanation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry that this one isn't as long as i had wanted it to be, but if i'd kept it as one long block it would've been quite ridiculously lengthy, so hopefully it'll be worth it.
> 
> Also, thank you so much to everyone who's been showing support through comments and kudos! Please don't hesitate to tell me what you think, or if you have any suggestions!

As if she knew, Essie drew away from the demon, grinning. Without looking behind her to see Aziraphale standing in front of the sofa, she straightned up and placed a heavy boot in the center of Crowley’s chest to keep him on the floor. Although the demon was free of the incapacitating spell her kiss had been inflicting on him, the shock and horror still rendered him unable to move. 

“The angel awakens,” she drawled, her green eyes lingering on Crowley’s. 

“Aziraphale…” began Crowley, weakly. 

“ _Don’t._ ” The angel’s voice was colder than Crowely had ever heard it before, and it shut him up immediately. He was really in trouble now.

“Oh, Mr Charming,” she sang to the demon on the ground before her. “Did you think you were _pure?”_

Aziraphale’s eyes were fixed on Essie, who turned her head dramatically to meet his gaze. She looked downright _gleeful_ at the tension filling the room with a horrible, static energy.

“You know, you weren’t supposed to wake up until I had finished taking care of your pet demon,” she continued to Aziraphale with the casually disappointed air of one commenting on how the weather had disrupted their Wednesday evening bicycle ride about town. “Seems I’ll have to do this another way, then.” 

Without warning, she delivered a powerful kick with the steel-toed tip of her boot directly to Crowley’s head. 

He yipped as stars exploded behind his eyes, accompanied by a deafening thunderclap of pain. An odd, high-pitched buzzing tone sang in his ears and drowned out what happened next. 

Essie sprang lithely from the disoriented demon, and went for Aziraphale. She flicked out a switchblade as she crossed the room.

Azi’s eyes widened and he instinctively used his still-extended wings to shield himself as she charged him, but he held his ground. He reached out as she raised her blade, and caught her wrist as it came down.

She twisted, not out of his grip, but so that she could reach the bloodstained bandage on his free arm. Aziraphale, taken aback, did not react before she had grabbed it and torn it from his arm. Then she was gone, teleported out of the bookshop and disappeared to God-knew-where, leaving only empty air in Aziraphale’s hand.

The angel stared at his palm for a moment, then surveyed the damage to his shop and to the demon lying stunned on the floor.

* * *

Thousands of miles below the Earth, in a deep, stinking hole filled with various vermin, likewise assorted filth, and an unholy amount of bad senses of humor, Essie approached a battered and moth-eaten sofa.

Occupying the sofa was a woman and a man. 

“Welcome back, daughter,” said the woman. Her voice was delicate, but contained shards of ice and broken glass beneath its breezy surface. “Have you got it?”

“Yup,” responded Essie with a grin, handing the angel’s bandage to her. 

The woman who took the scrap of red-soaked fabric from her had long black hair, pale skin, and she was Essies’s mother.

She was also a witch, by birth.

Essie was a demoness, but she was no _ordinary_ demoness. In fact, she was only half demoness. The other half of her as pure, black-magic sorceress. It was why she had been able to cast--well, _begin_ to cast a spell on Crowley to remove him from the equation while she extracted a blood sample from Aziraphale. 

The woman, whose name was Veranine, tutted at the bandage in her hand. “I would’ve preferred it to be fresh,” she said with some resignation, “but this will do.” 

“She took _all this time_ to get it, and it isn’t even _fresh?”_ said the man on the couch beside Veranine, his voice sounding unpleasantly like wet leaves being scrunched in a fist. 

“Hullo, Duke Hastur,” purred Essie. 

The senior demon grunted his acknowledgement, then said irritably, “Well, get on with it, witch.”

Veranine only gave him a condescending look. “Now, now, Hastur, please _do_ be patient. The Powers that Be understand how important this is, and that it is well worth the time it takes.”

“I still don’t understand what exactly it _is_ we’re doing,” whined Hastur, his beady black eyes glinting in the muddy light. 

Veranine took the bandage and inspected it, turning it over in her hand. “What we’re _doing,_ my incompetent friend, is clipping the wings of an angel.” 

Hastur smoldered at being called incompetent, whatever _that_ meant, but listened intently to what the witch was saying. 

“What our spell is going to do is remove the angelic properties of our dear Aziraphale, and gift him with free will."

The demon shrugged, still not getting it. 

Essie rolled her eyes and took over. She may not have the same powerful magic as her mother, but she understood well enough what was happening and why it was significant. “We are going to use this blood to complete an enchantment Mother had cast on Aziraphale a few weeks ago to turn him human. The enchantment is going to strip him of his _holiness--”_ she spat the word with a certain amount of disgust--“and render him a mere human. From there, he’ll be harmless. If it works, we can apply the same spell to all the angels of Heaven.”

Hastur sniffed. “Awright, then. It’ll be a slow process, but that’s craftmanship, that is.”

Veranine offered him a sly smile, then went to work.


	7. departure

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm sorry in advance

"Agggh, that _bitch,”_ groaned Crowley, who was now thoroughly battered and 100% _done_ with everything. He rolled over, wincing, and climbed to his feet gingerly. 

Aziraphale ignored him. He stood with his back to the demon, looking out the shop window. His head was bowed, and his wings, always so neatly preened and held proudly erect, were ragged and limp, their tips brushing the ground. They quivered ever so slightly.

They quivered because although he hid it well from Crowley, Aziraphale was trembling. 

In his mind, the scene he’d woken up to replayed in his mind over and over again. The _look_ on Crowley’s face… the _pleasure…_

“Aziraphale?” asked Crowley tentatively. 

The angel murmured something indistinct in reply, his head sinking even lower.

“W-what?” 

Aziraphale spun around, spreading his wings and launching himself into the air with a single, powerful beat. He hung there, hovering about five or so feet off the ground. White feathers scattered among books and papers, but neither of the two took any notice; Aziraphale was too furious, Crowley too frightened.

The angel’s face had twisted unrecognizably into a mask of white-hot fury and ineffable heartbreak. His normally sky-blue eyes were tinged purple around the irises, glowing dully. 

“You _snake!”_ he cried, the word piercing Crowley like a sword. 

He could only stare up at the raging angel, agape. His mind stopped working; he forgot to breathe. 

Aziraphale was crying, now— _my angel, never leave me, always love me,_ sang a dusty voice in Crowley’s head—and he drew a sharp breath. 

 He fixed his eyes down upon Crowley’s, and said quietly, “I trusted you.”

Without breaking his gaze he continued, his voice drawn tight with suppressed emotion, “I should have known better. I--”

Then, without warning, something happened. 

Aziraphale’s wings, a white blur in the air, began to smoke. First just at the tips, then spreading like fire--because that’s just what it was. The angel’s wings were burning.

He screamed as the sensitive white feathers burned away to ashes. It was very quick. By the time Aziraphale had collapsed to the ground in a shivering, smoking heap, they were gone. All that remained of the angel’s wings were sad little piles of ash on the ground, and two burnt spots on the back of his coat, the fabric scorched at the edges. Not even the bones remained. They were simply _gone,_ burned away as if by a witch’s curse. 

Crowley’s mind finally began to work again, and he rushed forward to help Aziraphale.

As he reached out, the angel jerked away from him. _“Don’t,”_ snarled Aziraphale dangerously, brokenly, “-- _touch me.”_  

Crowley recoiled. He was helpless now, unable to speak, unable to do anything but stare with huge, scared eyes. He had hurt Aziraphale. 

Badly.

Aziraphale did not meet his eyes. He picked himself up, wincing. His face sparkled with moisture. And he did not bother to hide the fact that he was trembling from Crowley.

Finally, he raised his gaze to regard the demon cowering before him, his eyes shards of ice and his voice even colder as he spoke: 

“I hope, boy, you are happy knowing that I was wrong about you.” 

Crowley short-circuited. He scrambled backwards, nearly tripping over the debris lying on the ground, and bolted.

He could not think what he was doing, he just knew that he had to get away from the angel, before he hurt him further. 

His mind reeled as he stumbled out onto the street, passerby giving him odd looks.

“It’s _July,_ what have you got those silly Halloween contacts in for?” murmured a grumpy old man irritably, shaking his head.

“Angel…” whispered Crowley, slipping into the Bentley parked outside, “I’m sorry…”

It would do no good. He had betrayed the only friend he’d ever had. And not just _friend,_ he’d betrayed the _angel_ who had loved him. Why, _why_ hadn’t he fought that bloody _harlot_ of a demoness harder?

_Because you didnt want to,_ hissed a voice in the back of his head. _You’re_ incapable _of loving him back, you know that right? You’ll_ never _be good enough for him. You’ve been deceiving him all these centuries, tricking him into thinking that he can trust you. Now the truth is out, isn’t it?_

_You’re not special._

_You’re a demon. A pawn of Hell, nothing more._

_You thought you could change, didn’t you? Guess what buddy, you Fell for a reason, and that reason is that you’re tainted._

Crowley drove home. 

* * *

Meanwhile, in the shop, Aziraphale stood at the window, watching sullenly as Crowley drove away.

Despite the fact that the demon had betrayed him, one thought kept crying out in his mind:

“Please,” he whispered, “don’t leave…”

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaaah i'm sorryyy  
> also sorry for the long wait between chapters, i took a break to work on other projects. Thank you so much for reading! Next chapter out soon!


	8. Success in Hell

Veranine sat back on the moth-eaten sofa, looking _very_ pleased with herself indeed. Essie stood nearby, a perfectly manicured hand resting on the curve of her hip. 

The witch set down the cloth with Aziraphale’s blood on it and admired the scorch marks that now adorned it where the bloodstains had been. 

“It worked better than we expected,” she said, a maliciously gleeful edge in her voice. “He’s human now. Completely, irreparably human. And thanks to you, daughter,” she breezed, giving Essie a proud smile, “the demon is now no longer a problem.” 

She paused then for a moment, considering. “Although, I originally would have preferred that you had left him unconscious in the shop like we had planned, I rather like how things turned out. He’s of no concern to us.”

Essie walked around the couch, stepping carefully around the various magical instruments that her mother had used to complete the spell, and sat down beside her. “I hear he’s an alcoholic,” the half-demoness offered with a sly grin. “He’ll probably drink himself right back here.” 

“Ladiezz,” said a new, albeit familiar, voice. 

Both of them immediately stood up at the sound of Lord Beelzebub’s buzzy words. 

“The Powers that Be are quite z--zat--” Beelzebub frowned, trying to pronounce the word without buzzing. They took a deep breath, making an odd face, and continued, “ _satizvied --”_ close enough “--with your efforts.” They gave them a cold smile, their teeth glinting unpleasantly in the murky light. “Ze angel izz human now?”

“Yes, lord,” said Veranine respectfully.  

Beelzebub nodded approvingly. “Good. We shall obzerve him for a period of time, to enzzyu-enzhu--” they closed their eyes “-- _enzzsure_ that everything izz in order. Then we shall begin phazze two.”

Veranine and Essie bowed their heads to the Lord of Hell, Veranine murmuring “Yes, my lord,” and Beelzebub departed without another word, the clouds of flies floating about their head zooming after them. 

Mother and daughter exchanged an excited glance and went about their other tasks. 

* * *

Crowley drove home in darkness. Sure, it was day out, but that made no difference. An eternal night had fallen over his mind; a black, starless cloak of selfishness and ignorance that he himself had lain over the sun and caused it to go out.

His sun had gone out. 

Numbly, he switched on the radio, not even bothering to go for Queen. He dimly knew that there was a chance that “ _Too Much Love Will Kill You,”_ or “ _Somebody to Love,”_ or even _“The Show Must Go On”_ would come drifting from the Blaupunkt, and that was simply not something he was prepared to contend with.

The radio crackled, and Crowley, desperate to focus on anything other than what had just transpired, strained himself to hear what was playing. Sounded like classic rock.

Suddenly he realized what it was. It was the same song that had played in his head during Aziraphale’s confrontation.

“ _Tears drop like diamonds, from your golden eyes,”_ sang the dusty, bluesy voice of Rick Springfield. _“Weep for me, archangel, and wash away the lies/I’ve run with demons much too long, now i thank God you’re mine…”_

A strangled cry escaped Crowley’s lips and he wrenched at the on/off knob. He gripped the steering wheel as if afraid it might fly off, holding on so tightly that his knuckles turned white. As he drove, tears dropped like diamonds from his golden eyes, weeping for his angel.

* * *

Aziraphale pulled himself together. He shook his head, clearing his mind. He couldn’t worry about Crowley now. 

The spots where his wings had burned away still sent sharp little twangs of pain through his torso, and he winced as he moved away from the window. Aziraphale surveyed the various books, papers, feathers, and other debris that lay strewn across the floor.

He snapped his fingers to tidy up the shop--even though he prided himself on being disorganized to discourage customers, there were certain standards that he kept--and nothing happened. 

No wings. No miracles. An idea grew in his mind, something about which he wasn’t sure how he felt. 

After all, it meant Heaven couldn’t ever come after him. No more responsibilities. 

Aziraphale sighed and began to clean up the shop by hand.


	9. A Demon In Despair

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Lots of angst to come!   
> Song credits, in order: (i probably should start doing this for the other chapters too)  
> “Too Much Love Will Kill You” Queen  
> “In the Land of the Blind” Rick Springfield   
> “Mr Crowley” Ozzy Osbourne

_ “--I used to bring you sunshine, now all I ever do is bring you down--” _

_ “--In the land of the blind, the one-eyed snake is king--” _

_ “--Did you think you were pure...” _

The radio was of no help to Crowley as he lay sprawled on a pristine white leather sofa in his luxurious Mayfield flat in London, a bottle in his hand and several more on the floor around him and on the table in front of him.

He absently gestured it off, staring at the ceiling through blurred vision. Hiccuping, he dragged himself up off the sofa, intending to wander drunkenly around the flat, lost in a depressed haze of self-loathing.

His own voice whispered in his mind,  _ “Unforgivable, that’s what i am… Part of a demon’s job description.”  _

Crowley sniffed, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand and tilting the bottle to his lips with the other. 

He didn’t know what he was drinking, but he expected it to be strong and bitter and burning, and that’s just what it was. 

He was too, except for the strong part.

He trudged into the bathroom for no apparent reason, and leaned unsteadily against the sink. He reached up towards his face, meaning to take off his sunglasses, and instead poked himself in the eye. The shades were still in Aziraphale’s shop. He hadn’t worn them since the angel had removed them from his face with a gentle hand.

The demon let out a quiet moan of despair as his swampy mind forced him to relive everything that had just occurred, for about the four-thousand-and-fourth time, despite his attempts to hinder it with ungodly amounts of alcohol.

Oh, he’d  _ hindered  _ it, alright, but he hadn’t stopped it.

As Essie pinned him again and again in his mind’s eye, she turned into other people. 

First it was the Archangel Gabriel pinning him, his hands like lead weights on Crowley’s white-clad shoulders. 

_ “You’re a  _ bad  _ angel, Raphael,”  _ he grinned with malicious delight.  _ “Say goodbye to that principality you’ve been so friendly with lately. You’ll never see him again, unless he’s smiting you when Armaggeddon comes!” _

Then the violet-eyed archangel shoved him, hard. Crowley cried out, whimpering like a child as the flames consumed him and he fell, he Fell, away from Aziraphale and into the boiling pits of sulfur to join Lucifer and the guys, he hadn’t  _ asked  _ to be a demon, no, he’d just hung out with the wrong people, and he didn’t  _ need  _ Aziraphale, he had lots of people to  _ fraternize _ with _ , angel _ \--

Gabriel had become Aziraphale, and now he was leaving him, storming away because he assumed that Crowley was being selfish, asking for a suicide pill to get him out of trouble should it come. Aziraphale, seeing him as the snake he was.

Crowley shut his eyes, shaking his head vigorously, trying to rid himself of the images his muddled mind were showing him. 

This wasn’t a good idea, seeing as it just made him feel sick. 

He coughed, his head spinning, and turned on the faucet to splash himself with some cold water. He set the bottle, nearly empty, down on the counter, then cupped his hands underneath the cool flow and unceremoniously flung it upon his face. 

It did nothing. Dripping, he looked up at the mirror above the sink at his reflection. 

He looked a mess. His eyes were bloodshot and puffy, and there was a smear of bloodred lipstick across his mouth. 

Crowley made a sound as if he had been punched in the gut, and frantically clawed at the lipstick. It came off, but very slowly. He panted as he wiped at it with the back of his hand, each movement driving nails into the back of his head, but he refused to stop until he had gotten all of it off. 

Then he grabbed the bottle and staggered out of the bathroom, towards the bedroom. 

Breathing heavily and shaking from a million different things at once, he broke down. Crowley slid down against the side of the bed, clutching the bottle to his trembling chest. As he sank onto the floor, his arm bumped against a side table with a plant on it and knocked it over. 

The mirrored glass bowl shattered on the ground. 

Crowley started violently, staring at the broken glass on the floor among bits of dirt and the leaves of the plant with huge eyes. 

Then, slowly, he reached over towards it and picked up a piece of glass, turning it over in his hands. He caught sight of his reflection in the glass shard, his slitted yellow eyes gazing brokenly back at him. 

_ You SNAKE! _

His vision blurred with a fresh flood of tears at the memory of Aziraphale’s voice. 

His eyes, his  _ snake eyes,  _ they reminded him of who he was and that he couldn’t ever change that. 

His grip on the piece of glass tightened. 

Anthony J Crowley was a demon. He belonged in Hell. 

_ Tainted, you’re tainted,  _ sang the cynical voice in his mind, only it was in his heart now too, spreading like venom from a serpent’s bite. 

It was that, it was  _ venom,  _ it was in his  _ blood,  _ always was and always would be. He had been a fool to think he could escape it. He had believed, for a few thousand years, that Aziraphale could change him. 

It was  _ he  _ who had been trying to change Aziraphale. 

_ Yes, yes,  _ cackled the voice in his head and in his heart, his breaking heart.  _ You, serpent, you’ve been manipulating that angel. You love him, you do, but that’s not enough to escape the bottom line.  _

“And what’s that?” hiccuped Crowley, his voice thick and cracked with so many kinds of pain. He was beginning to believe the venom’s words. 

_ You’ll never be good enough. The bottom line is, you’re a  _ demon  _ and he’s an  _ angel. 

_ You belong in Hell.  _


	10. Intentions?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is so much shorter than i would have liked it to be but...

Beelzebub stared intently at the babbling demon before them, utterly unimpressed with what he was saying. Or trying to say, anyway. 

“I _think,”_ said Hastur desperately, trying to grasp at any shred of respect that his superior still held for him, “that they’re going to-to er, yknow, erm…”

“That izz quite enough, Duke Haztur,” cut Beelzebub coolly through the demon’s spluttering. He clearly had no idea what he was talking about. 

Beelzebub hadn’t really expected him to, honestly. 

“Vanezza,” they called nonchalantly. “Can you explain to me your plan for thizz new zpell?”

Essie, who has been in another part of Hell with the tortured souls, not actually torturing anyone but simply standing by and watching, heard the Lord of the Flies call her and _bamf—_ she was standing in front of them, nudging Hastur out of her way with a sharp elbow. 

“Yeah, ‘course,” she said, narrowing her eyes at a fly that was zooming around her head in dizzy circles. 

Beelzebub blinked and it flew obediently back to the main cloud. 

Essie flicked a piece of fiery hair out of her eye and said, “We got a mole up top, she’s feeding us info on the whereabouts of all angels assigned to Earth. We’re gonna do the same thing that we did to Aziraphale, strip them of their angelic qualities and render them human.” 

She paused, allowing Beelzebub to give her a nod indicating they understood, then continued. “Obviously, when hundreds of angels fail to report, Heaven will be obliged to send _more_ angels down to investigate, and we’ll repeat the process. We--”

Beelzebub held up a hand to halt Essie. “Zat is zzufficient to me, Vanezza,” they buzzed. “The fact that the spell _workz_ is obviouzly a huge victory for Hell, but we still need to be _very careful_ in the execution of it _,_ do you zee?” 

Their tone suggested that they expected a simple yes or no.

Essie bit her tongue. Although she detested authority of any kind, she sensed that to cross this particular authority would likely result in something dreadful.

She bowed in submission, which seemed to satisfy the Lord of the Flies. 

“We have already failed Armageddon once, Ezzie,” said Beelzebub, surprising Essie by using her nickname. Despite everything, Essie kind of viewed the superior demon as almost a parental figure. And in a twisted, evil way, they were that, helping the young half-demoness to learn to be evil to the fullest degree. 

But an unstable danger lurked beneath the surface, something Essie did not want to disturb.

“We will not fall z--zhor--” Beelzebub paused, screwing their face up in concentration at pronouncing the word, somewhat contrasting with the serious and sinister air that Essie had just established the demon as emanating. Their infection-riddled mouth twisted, and they got the word out distinguishably, “-- _shzort_ of destroying Heaven again. If we do, it will fall upon _your_ shoulderzz.”

Without another buzzy word, they departed. 

Hastur, who had been witnessing the entire exchange silently, his mouth slightly open, leered at Essie as she watched the retreating back of the Lord of Hell.

“What are _you_ lookin’ at?” she growled testily at Hastur, who, forgetting that he was a Duke of Hell and that he outranked her, hastily shuffled off to leer at someone else.

Now alone, Essie ran a hand through her hair and breathed a sigh of relief. 

Beelzebub had approved.

Now she had some more time to think about the next move before Hell dispatched a wave of demons to begin the process.

And the “mole” would be expecting a report from her. 

Essie turned her head to glance up at the damp, moldy ceiling above her, thought about her next destination, and disappeared.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if this gets too difficult to follow, please let me know!


	11. A Phone Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you all so so much for all the support on tumblr and on here! 
> 
> We’re more or less halfway through here, this has been an absolute joy to write, and i’m so glad you guys enjoy it!

Anathema was free.

Ever since Armagedidn’t, the Little Armageddon that Couldn’t, Armagoddamnit-you-guys-we-were-this-close, whatever you wanted to call the botched attempt at the end of the world, she had been free.

Free of being a professional descendant, free from Agnes’ expectations, and free from constantly having to putter about on old Phaeton with its new gearbox and pump kit, examining lay-lines and mapping the stars and various other occult practices necessary for deciphering the only accurate prophecies ever made.

Right now, she was enjoying her freedom with Newt on the porch of Jasmine Cottage in Lower Tadfield, sipping homemade lemonade and listening to the birdsong that always filled the quaint little town at this time of day.

Then the phone rang from inside the house.

Anathema made to get up, and Newt immediately sprang to stay her, saying, “I’ll get it.”

She gave him an appreciative smile, and took a sip of her lemonade.

He entered the house, careful not to trip over the orange cat that lay sprawled across the doorframe, tripped anyway with a loud, high squall that did _not_ belong to the cat, and hurried to the ringing phone before the ansaphone could get it.

“Yes, h-hullo, Jasmine Cottage,” he answered into the receiver, fixing his glasses.

“Hello?” replied a quiet, prim English voice. It was smooth, educated, and familiar.

Newt racked his mind for why it was familiar, and realized it was the same voice as one of the Witchfinder Army’s only twentieth-century clients. The one that Shadwell referred to as the “soft Southern pansy” at great length. Now what was his _name…?_

“Is anyone there?” asked the voice, the tone sounding concerned. There was something subtly unsettled about it, as if its owner were hiding something. They were hiding it very well, for Newt picked up on absolutely nothing. He realized that the person on the other end was bewildered by the long silence that accompanied Newt’s attempt to recall why they sounded familiar.

“Er, yeah, sorry… Who is this?”

The person seemed to have the same memory strain and moment of fuzzy recognition as Newt, only his was much quicker, and actually successful.

“Is this Newton Pulsifer?” asked the voice on the phone.

Taken aback, he stayed silent for another moment, then answered in the affirmative. Then Newt repeated his question.

“Oh, I’m terribly sorry, how rude of me,” said the voice, sounding abashed. “Been a day for me, I’m afraid. This is Aziraphale, I believe we met on one occasion, although I can’t quite recall when that occasion was, although it must have been quite important…” His ramblings faded off into slightly confounded silence.

Newt nodded, mouth slightly open, then remembered that he was talking on the phone and said “Yes, I thought I sort of recognized your voice… Er, anyway, wha-what can I do for you?”

Aziraphale paused a moment, then said slightly apologetically, “Erm, yes, I was actually hoping to reach Miss Device? Anathema? Is she in?”

As an afterthought, he added, “It is a somewhat urgent matter.”

“Yeah, she is, I’ll go fetch her, shall I…” Newt covered the mouthpiece of the receiver and called out the open door, “Anathema! You’ve got a call, from-from that Aziraphale bloke, from…” he trailed off, trying to remember and failing. He knew that they all had met at some point, something about Armageddon. There had been Aziraphale, whom Newt knew vaguely was an angel but didn’t really _understand_ that he was an actual angel--one of the remarkable abilities of the human brain--and a demon..? called Crowley, who was a mysterious fellow, and there had been a lot of kids, and…

“I’ll be right there!” called Anathema back as she got up, smoothed her dress, and hurried to meet Newt at the wall-mounted housephone.

“Here,” said Newt, handing her the receiver. “He said it’s urgent.”

Anathema nodded, the phone already to her ear.

“Hello?” she said, not really sure what else to say.

“Yes, hullo, is this Miss Device?” said Aziraphale cautiously.

“Yes.”

“Alright, then. I, er, I have, erhm..” Aziraphale’s voice sounded incredibly agitated, and it was causing him to be rather incoherent.

Anathema knew what the moment required.

“Azu-Aziraphale, is everything okay?” she asked quietly, for a second unsure of how to pronounce his name.

The angel fell silent for a moment, evidently struggling with how much to tell her. Finally he admitted in a small, slightly trembling voice, “No. No, my dear, i am afraid not.”

He explained, with a few cracked words, what had occurred, and what his suspicions were. He told her about Crowley, about Essie, whose name he had heard when she’d pinned the demon to the ground, about how Crowley had been tempted and given in, about his wings burning and his inability to perform miracles.

“I fear,” he said after she had listened thoughtfully, “that I am no longer an angel.”

Anathema pondered this. She hadn’t the faintest clue of how to deal with this, nor how to help the angel. She had very, very little experience with the supernatural. But there were a _few_ things that she could do, until she figured out precisely what she was dabbling about in.

“Aziraphale, where are you?”

There was a sharp intake of breath as if he were about to dispute her coming to the bookshop, but then he seemed to realize how limited his options were.

“Soho. In London,” he added, remembering that she was American.

“I can be there in about an hour and a half,” Anathema said, politely not assuring him that she did, in fact, know where Soho was, since the shops there sold a lot of the equipment she used in her occulting.

“Right,” answered Aziraphale awkwardly, touched that a woman whom he barely knew would drop everything to help him. “Thank you,” he said, a little emotionally, but tried to conceal it.

Anathema, who was much better at reading emotions than her fiancé (Newt had proposed to her a few days after Armageddidn’t,) saw right through him.  

“No problem at all,” she said gently. “I’m going to hang up now, Aziraphale, and I’ll be there as soon as i can.”

He thanked her again, gave her his bookshop’s address, and thanked her one more time. Then she replaced the receiver onto its cradle and looked at Newt, who had been standing there the entire time.

“I’m going out,” she told him, “to visit him. Mind if I borrow Dick Turpin? London’s a bit far to bike.”

“Yeah, ‘course,” said Newt. “Be careful, alright?”

Anathema gave him a smile, and a quick kiss.

“I will. Love you.”

“I love you,” called Newt after her as she gathered a few things, grabbed the Robin’s keys off the counter, and departed.


	12. She Hears

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> agggh ik i’m uploading twice in one day but i’m On A Roll™️ and wanna get stuff up as soon as it’s written

Crowley knelt amidst the shattered pieces of reflective glass, his heavy, aching head bowed as though in prayer.

The broken segments showed him the distorted reflections of himself, taunting him with their wickedly sharp edges.

_Wicked._

Crowley was the bowl that had been entrusted to support and protect the life inside. Aziraphale had been the plant, fragile and beautiful and blissfully faithful in his support.

And Crowley was also himself, in his own agitation knocking the bowl carelessly to the floor and shattering it, leaving the plant inside exposed and vulnerable.

And now Crowley was the broken, deadly sharp pieces lying on the ground.

His head was bowed as though he was in prayer because he was.

The demon was crying, holding the single shard in his trembling hands, and he was praying.

“Why?” he asked of God. “Why would you let me believe that I could? Why would you give me hope?”

She did not reply, but unbeknownst to Crowley, She heard.

And She listened to the agony of Her creature, Fallen and sinful and drunk and broken though he was.

“You knew. Right from our Creation, you knew that I would love him,” Crowley continued hoarsely. His eyes no longer saw his reflection in the glass.

Instead, they saw Heaven as it was before the Earth was created, before Hell was created, before the Rebellion.

They saw the lights in his hands, fledgling stars that would become the sun, that would become Alpha Centuri, that would become Sirius and Betelgeuse and all the other stars of the cosmos.

They saw Aziraphale, the newest angel to be born into the celestial ranks, meant to guard the future Eastern Gate of the Garden of Eden.

And meant to fight in the impending Rebellion, but none of them, not even the Archangels, knew that there would be a war. Sure, some of the angels were a bit huffy, particularly that Lucifer, whom Raphael didn’t much like but hung around anyway because he and his gang were more interesting, but they all were obedient.

And his eyes saw God, her serene, knowing smile rather brighter than usual as She observed Raphael’s progress in creating the nebulae.

Raphael.

“You knew, from the moment that you created us,” repeated Crowley, “that I would fall in love with him. I would build the stars for him, and i would make one especially for him. I made Alpha Centuri just for him, made it beautiful, made it the _closest_ to where the Earth would be so that when he was sent down, he would see it every night. You _knew,”_ cried Crowley, raising his head to gaze imploringly upwards, golden eyes glittering with tears that streamed down his face.

“And still you let me Fall away from him. And then, _and then,”_ he howled, everything he’d kept bottled up for thousands and thousands of years pouring out of him now, “you gave me another chance. They let me go up top, to the Garden where he was… and for six thousand years, I got him back. He didn’t remember me, but that didn’t matter. And now…”

He bowed his head again, staring at the piece of glass in his hands, seeing his serpent’s eyes that had been given to him upon his Fall.

 _A reminder,_ they’d told him with an awful, rueful grin. Rueful because they all had their own reminders.

“And now you’re putting back in my place.”

Suddenly his choked-back sobs ceased; he wiped his tears, and he looked up.

He nodded, a terrible calmness taking him over, accompanied by a grim determination.

“You’re putting me in my place. I’m a demon,” he said quietly. “And I can promise you, I won’t forget that again. I could never harm that angel. But I can’t love him either, as you’ve been _so keen_ to show me, so I might as well mosey on back to Hell.”

He gritted his teeth, tried and failed to stop the single tear from slipping out and tracing down his face. Some optimistic part of his mind screamed at him, that this wasn’t the right answer, that maybe he could ask for forgiveness, that _there was another way,_ but Crowley ignored it.

_Unforgivable, that’s what I am._

God sat back, annoyed. She knew what was going to happen, and had also known that Crowley would ignore Her urging to stop what he was about to do, but still. It was frustrating whenever one of Her creatures asked for guidance, a sign, etc, and then blatantly ignored the response She gave.

The demon’s grip on the piece of glass tightened, so that it cut a little into the flesh of his hand and sent tiny rivulets of blood trickling down his palm, but that was nothing compared to what was about to flow.

He belonged in Hell, so there was no point staying on Earth, was there? The reason he’d told his superiors that he’d stayed on Earth in the first place was so that he didn’t have to do deskwork and they’d thought that was fair enough, but it was really so that he could be with Aziraphale.

He shoved up his shirt sleeve, his hand shaking a little, and hovered the piece of glass over a spot just below his elbow, intending to slash down the entire length of his forearm.

For a moment he reflected on how this would be fitting. It would be fairly slow, much like the growth of his hope to finally be able to love Aziraphale in peace, and end with self-inflicted failure.

He wondered what they would say when he turned back up there, without a body after the stunt he and the angel had pulled on them with the holy water.

He expected they would probably try it again.

 _Enough dallying,_ spat the venom in his mind. _Get on with it._

Crowley drew a deep breath, and as another tear fell shimmering from his eye, raised the shard in his shaking hand and dealt the blow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if anything gets confusing, or if you find any plot holes, please please tell me! as always, thank you for reading!  
> Oh and we love the Raphael!Crowley headcanon here so if you’re confused as to who the hell Raphael is, it’s a headcanon some of the fandom has that before Crowley Fell, he was the Archangel Raphael and worked with God to make the stars.


	13. Revelations, Part One

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one was really a pain to write, as I'm currently battling a particularly fierce bout of that horrid and debilitating disease known as writer's block lol. Sorry if this is clunky, hopefully the next one will flow easier. As always, thanks for the sustenance of hits, comments and kudos! You don't have to if you don't want to, but feedback and suggestions are always very highly appreciated so that I can make sure I'm writing content people will actually enjoy and not just shouting into the void. Thank you so much!

Essie gave a furtive glance about her, then pulled her hood over her head. She stuffed her hands into her pockets and stalked out of the dark alleyway in London. 

As she did so, another woman nearly crashed into her. She dropped a box of strange metallic objects that clattered onto the ground, and Essie immediately stooped to pick them up for her. 

The woman looked to be in a hurry. 

“Oh, I’m sorry!” she fretted with an American accent. “That was my fault. Thank you,” she added as Essie handed her the box with the strange objects neatly set back inside. 

Essie recognized a few of the devices. They were things you would find in a witch’s array of equipment. Her mother used some of them. She quickly hid her surprise with a smile and assured the woman, “Don’t worry about it.”

The other woman nodded politely and hurried off, in the same direction Essie was headed. 

The half-demoness gave her a few minutes to be on her way, so as not to make things awkward, and looked up at the sky. 

It was cloudy and grey, and told of an impending thunderstorm. 

Essie glanced back in the direction that the woman had gone. She was nowhere in sight. 

She blinked her luminous green cat’s eyes, adjusted her black sweatshirt’s hood, and continued on her way as the first drops of the promised storm began to fall. 

* * *

As soon as Anathema entered the shop, she knew exactly what had happened. 

Well, not all of it, but she definitely knew what had changed about Aziraphale. 

“Thank you so much for coming, my dear,” said the angel as he bowed her into his shop.

Anathema gave him a once-over. He looked as tired as he had sounded on the telephone. There were two ragged holes in the back of his prim tan coat that looked like cigarette burns, only much larger. 

There were also deep red bloodstains on one of his coatsleeves, and Anathema could see a bandage sticking out the end. 

Aziraphale led her to a battered sofa adorned with a tartan blanket, and gestured to a tea tray set on a table nearby. 

Anathema set down her box, then took a teacup and watched as the dapper angel settled himself down beside her. He picked up a teacup and saucer, and delicately took a sip at it, but when he gingerly placed the cup back into its saucer, it clinked and clattered quietly. 

His druxy gaze flitted to and fro, nervously. Anathema narrowed her eyes to see his aura. 

She had seen it previously, at the airfield, and even though she couldn’t recall exactly what had happened there, she  _ did  _ remember that he and that Crowley bloke had had different auras than any other she had seen. They were larger, for starters, and had two areas that extended in large arcs around empty air behind them, in vague triangle shapes. 

They also glowed differently than humans'. Aziraphale’s had shone pure gold, like the sun’s rays, but was atinged with red at the edges. Crowley’s had been that same shade of deep bloodred, gleaming dully, but tinged with Aziraphale’s gold color at the outside. 

Aziraphale’s aura was no longer gold, or red. Nor were there the outlines of his wings. 

It was a dull, glassy lovat color, blue and green and grey swirling together. Occasionally there would be a streak of white.  Anathema recalled what her mother had taught her about the color of people’s auras:

_ Green: guilt, remorse, can mean envy but i doubt it in his case; Blue: fear; Grey: sadness, stormy; White: isolation, despair… _

_ He’s lost everything,  _ Anathema realized. First he’s betrayed by the man he’d loved for eons, then he loses his angelity. 

_ And i have no idea how to help him.  _

“Aziraphale, I think you’re right,” she said. “About how you suspect you’re no longer an angel.”

His eyes flicked over to her, fixing her with a guarded look. He looked as if he were about to say something, but did not. 

“Your aura, it’s… changed,” she continued. “You say a demoness was here, but I don’t think a demoness would be able to do that to you.”

Aziraphale nodded. “She wouldn’t,” he said, “no more than an angel would be able to strip a demon of his powers. I  _ do  _ think, however, that a black-magic sorceress could do it if she combined her magic with a demon’s.”

Anathema looked taken aback. “A goetic witch could do that?”

Aziraphale nodded again solemnly. “Provided she had sufficient supplies and access to the correct texts. With a demon’s assistance, very,  _ very  _ powerful Satanic feats can be accomplished. I also have more reason to believe a goetic witch is involved…”

He told her about the dream that he had had, after the business with the clay shard. He told her about the voices that he had heard, including the one he knew to belong to a demon by the name of Hastur, with whom he had had a few dealings with over the centuries. 

Just after he had finished, as Anathema was about to give her analysis of the dream, there was a knock at the door to the shop. 


	14. Revelations, Part Two

Aziraphale and Anathema exchanged a glance. 

“We’re closed!” called Aziraphale. 

There was a moment of silence, then a muffled voice replied, “I know. Open the door, Aziraphale.”

Anathema shot Aziraphale a look. “Do you know them?” she whispered. 

He didn’t answer, but his face had paled at the person’s voice. 

Anathema calculated the risk of answering the door. Just as she was about to get up, Aziraphale rose slowly to his feet and, seeming to snap back to reality, walked briskly to the door. His hands clenched into fists as his expression darkened. 

“Why are you here?” he demanded with a low, dangerous edge in his voice. 

“Because I need to explain what’s going on,” Essie answered calmly, her words even and calculated. 

Aziraphale’s mouth twisted into a fearsome, mocking snarl. His features were etched in cold, hard stone that radiated contempt. “You must be either stupid or insane to think that i would  _ ever  _ trust you,” he spat with more fire in his words than in all of Hell. They dripped with venom, and sounded like they might actually burn one’s ears upon being heard. 

Anathema realized that her original impression of the angel being a soft, gentle, and quiet type was just that, a mere impression. Beneath the surface was something rather more unstable… and  _ frightening.  _ She found herself pressing her body into the couch. 

Essie, on the other hand, was unimpressed. She’d heard all about the angel from her superiors, who were formerly Aziraphale’s superiors as well. 

She had read Gabriel’s rather hysterical account of the angel “breathing hellfire, to which he appeared immune” when an attempt to execute him had been made after Armaggeddidn’t. 

She had also read Beelzebub’s cold, detached report of a similar event occurring during the attempted execution of Crowley, in which they gave a description of the disgraced demon “flicking holy water at onlookers, and requesting a rubber duck.”

Apparently he also had the Archangel Michael manifest him a towel.

Essie had laughed herself silly when she pictured the tall, regal woman being faced with a demon in a tub of holy water lazily asking for a towel. What was funnier was that she had  _ complied.  _

Heavenly angels. Always so damn  _ soft  _ in their pure state. But they were necessary, nevertheless. 

That was something Essie grasped that no other angel or demon ever did. 

“You don’t have to trust me,” she said through the door. “I just want you to listen to me. If you don’t let me in,” she continued, a low warning growl creeping into her voice, “I’ll have to let  _ myself  _ in. You need to hear what I have to say, angel.”

Aziraphale’s snarl faded at the last word. The way that she had said it, it broke something in him. 

Anathema observed him warily as he bowed his head, slipped the lock off the door, and pulled it open. 

Essie blinked, her slitted pupils dilating to an almond-like shape as they adjusted to the murky light of the bookshop. 

Then they narrowed as they fell upon Anathema, whose face showed the same recognition. 

Before either could say anything, Aziraphale huffed irritably, “Are you going to come in or not?”

His eyes were clouded and the fight had drained from them. He suddenly looked his true age. 

Essie stepped into the bookshop, and Aziraphale let the door slam shut on her heel. She stood in front of the table, hands on her hips. Aziraphale faced her, his gaze like steel daggers being hurled in the half-demoness’ direction. She deflected it nonchalantly.

Aziraphale continued to stare at her in silence for a few moments, then made an exaggerated sweeping gesture with his arm. “Say what you want to say,  _ my dear _ ,” he snarled vehemently, flinging the last two words at her with bared teeth and curled lips. 

Essie regarded him coolly for a moment more, then raised her eyebrows and shrugged. 

“Alright then. First of all, I get that you have no reason to trust me, but I had to try. If you reject me, it’ll make my job a helluva lot harder but I’ll manage. I’m gonna start by telling you something you probably already know.”

She paused, flicking her tongue over her lips. She’d have to choose her opening wisely. “That demon? He loves you.”

Aziraphale blinked. An unreadable expression passed over his face, then was gone. He said nothing.

“And I’m sorry that I had to do that to him, but I had to stay on Hell’s good side. As you can imagine, they don’t like him much.”

Aziraphale still said nothing. Anathema watched with fascination, and realized this must be the demoness he had spoke of.

Essie looked at Anathema, a smirk curling her lip. “Yeah, that’s me,” she said, to Anathema’s astonishment. “But you’re not entirely right. I’m only half demoness, and even  _ that’s  _ not right. I’m half human witch, and half angel.”

She rolled her eyes when Anathema and Aziraphale both gave her blank, uncomprehending  looks. “Everyone assumed that because my father was a demon that  _ I  _ would be a demon, too. Nobody bothered to remember that demons are born as angels. Just ‘cos my father  _ Fell  _ doesn’t mean I’d be born Fallen, too.

“As for being able to use black magic and read your mind, my mother is a very powerful witch. I’ve inherited some of her abilities, and she’s taught me quite a bit.”

Essie paused to study Aziraphale’s face. He looked skeptical but was listening.

“You wouldn’t come here just to tell me that,” he said testily.

Essie nodded. “And you’re correct. I’ve come here to tell you a few things, actually. I’m a double agent,” she said dramatically. “I work for Heaven. Or at least, I work to save it. Listen, you’re just the beginning, Aziraphale,” she said seriously. “What happened to you, Hell’s planning on doing it to  _ all  _ the angels on Earth. They’re preparing to send demons out to each angel assigned here as we speak. 

“But that’s not all,” she continued, her eyes wide and solemn.

Aziraphale considered what she was saying, and studied her expressions carefully. “Prove it,” he cut her off.

She looked taken aback. “Excuse me?” 

“Prove you’re telling the truth.”

Essie gave him a look like he was a madman. “Are you  _ daft?  _ Think about it! Why would I be telling you this? Why would I sidle up to you and say ‘hey, i’m not actually a demoness, i’m really trying to stop bloody  _ Armaggeddon  _ from happening again!”

She stared at him, mouth slightly open. “Aziraphale, Heaven  _ knows  _ about this! I  _ told them!!  _ And what did they decide to do? They’re going to sacrifice these angels, they’re going to  _ let  _ Hell _ do  _ this, and they’re going to use it as an excuse for  _ war!” _


	15. The Visitation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you guys for the support! Tell me what you think of it, or if you have suggestions or questions as to clarity issues!

Crowley opened his eyes. His hand clasping the shard could not move; it was frozen, the point of the piece of glass hovering half a millimeter above the pale skin of his forearm. Blood from the cut on the palm of his hand, inflicted by the sharp edges of the broken bowl pressed into his flesh by how tightly he was holding it, dripped sluggishly down and spattered onto his arm and the floor. 

His wide, scared gaze flitted upwards into a pair of light, piercing blue eyes. Familiar blue eyes. 

Crowley’s jaw fell open, and he tried to make words but he seemed to have forgotten how. 

“Put it down,” said Adam quietly, but firmly. “I’m gonna let you go, but you have to promise to put it down, okay?”

A million and seven thoughts were bouncing around his head, all of them questions, but Crowley found himself nodding silently. He didn’t notice, but another tear trailed down his face. 

Help had come. 

She had heard. 

Adam blinked, and the force holding Crowley’s arm in place released him. The demon let the piece of bloody, broken glass fall to the ground with an innocuous clatter. He stared open-mouthed at Adam. He began to think that he was imagining the boy, but Adam smiled and shook his head. 

“You’re not imagining me, I promise,” he said. “I’m real.” He knocked on the table on which the plant had been situated, grinning softly. “See? Real.”

Crowley finally pulled himself together. “H-How did you get in?” he asked hoarsely. He was still drunk, he noticed, and quickly sobered up. 

Adam pointed at the open door. “‘S unlocked.”

Fair enough. 

“How did you know to come? Why are you even  _ in  _ London??” 

Adam shrugged. “My dad hadta come to London for his job or something. I dun really know, he didn’t say much about it.”

The rational part of Crowley’s brain began to work again. “Does he know where you  _ are?”  _

Adam shook his head again. “He thinks I’m at my aunt’s flat, in Croydon. He dropped me off there for a visit, but she never pays any attention to me. I told her I was gointa a friend’s place and she just said ‘Fine, be careful, and be back by supper,’ and went back to watchin’ telly. I think she was watching  _ the Golden Girls,”  _ he added helpfully, wrinkling his nose a little. “I prefer cartoons, myself. Dunno why you would want to watch a bunch of people being dramatic over stupid stuff.” He shrugged. 

Crowley gave him a blank look. Adam noticed the wet streaks on Crowley’s face. 

“Why are you crying?” he asked. 

Crowley only then seemed to remember himself why he had been crying. He bit his lip, accidentally drawing blood as he forgot he had fangs. Yet more tears threatened to spill out of his once-again brimming eyes.

Adam sensed that it was something bad, but wasn’t quite sure how to help. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” he offered quietly, a bit alarmed. He had never seen a grown up cry, not like this. Anathema’s crying had been out of exasperation and disbelief; Crowley’s were from something much deeper. 

Crowley bit it back. He wasn’t going to keep on like this. It would do no good. He had to find a way to fix it. 

He was utterly horrified at himself for thinking that it would be over just like that. Aziraphale _knew_ him! The angel would understand that Crowley still loved him. It frightened him that he had been so ready to give it all up, just like that, because of some green-eyed _bitch_ of a demoness with a tigress tattoo. 

_ What is  _ wrong  _ with me?  _ Crowley wondered vaguely. A small tendril of hope had begun to worm its way back into his heart, and it was driving out the venom. Always the optimist, beneath everything. Sometimes he just needed saving, that was all.

“Mr Crowley?” Adam asked tentatively. “Are you alright?”

The demon wiped his eyes on his shirt sleeve, and took a deep, steadying breath. “Yeah, kid,” he said. “I was crying because I thought I lost my best friend. Again. And it was my fault.” He gave Adam a reassuring smile. “I was in a dark place, but you pulled me out just in time. Hey,” he said, frowning, “you never answered me. How  _ did  _ you know to come here?”

Adam looked thoughtful for a minute. “I dunno, actually. I got.. this weird feeling in my heart, like someone was telling me I had to go somewhere. And that was here, and here you were, and I only managed to stop you in time.” He shrugged again.

Crowley reminded himself that the boy  _ was  _ the Antichrist, after all. He could probably sense things, even if he didn’t realize it.

Which was extremely lucky for the demon. Or maybe…

Maybe it wasn’t so lucky. Maybe it wasn’t simply a matter of being in the right place at the right time, maybe it was a matter of being  _ told  _ to be in the right place at the right time.

Crowley looked at Adam. “Thanks, kid. If it weren’t for you, I’d be back in Hell right now. Now, I need your help.”

Adam grinned. He was always up for an adventure. “I--”

He was interrupted by a sharp yip. 

Crowley gave Adam an almost sharp expression. “Is that--”

Just then, a small black-and-white dog ran excitedly into the room, jumping up and down and wagging his tail. 

The demon sighed and shook his head. He should’ve known that wherever the boy went, the hellhound would follow.

Dog stilled, staring up at Crowley. He appeared to recognize the demon from his time in Hell. 

Crowley stared back, then growled at the dog, “If you even  _ think  _ about touching my plants, I’ll send you right back to that cage they kept you in.”


	16. Revelations, Part Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long wait! I hit a roadblock, and also took a break to work on the other stories posted on my account. It might take me a little to get back into the swing of this story, so i apologize if this is clunky. If there are any mistakes or discontinuities, please let me know! Thanks guys!

“Alright. Say that we believe you,” began Aziraphale coldly. “Say that you really aren’t a demoness, and that you’re trying to stop Hell from doing this thing. Why would you do that to Crowley?”

Essie gave him a look. “I  _ told  _ you. I had to get him out of the way. I wasn’t expecting him to be in the shop. So i had to… improvise. The spell i was going to cast on him involves harnessing his...” —she cleared her throat awkwardly—“ _ lust,  _ and using it like a drug to dim his judgement, muddle his emotions, and render him useless for a time. If i hadn’t, he would have stopped me, and then i would’ve gotten in trouble for failing and then nothing would have stood between Hell and starting Armageddon, this time for  _ real.”  _

Aziraphale snorted. “Right. Okay then. You said Heaven knows, so why did they let me be turned?” His face was something horribly dark. He knew the answer to his question.

Essie blinked. “They want Hell to think they’re succeeding, and they decided to disregard your ‘wings being clipped,’ as they put it. They thought you were dangerous anyway.

“They’re going to wait until the first wave of demons turn up to do the thing. And then they’re going to send angels to kill them. They’ll declare open war on Hell for this. 

“To be fair, though,” she said, “it is technically a valid reason to declare war. But considering it would result in the destruction of earth and everything, we ought to stop it.”

Aziraphale looked at Anathema.

“I believe her,” she said. 

Aziraphale considered. It sounded like Heaven, alright. Gabriel was probably at the center of this. 

He decided to trust her. 

“Alright, Vanessa,” he said, throwing his hands up. “What do we do about it?”

Essie stuck her hands in the pockets of her hoodie. “I don’t know. I don’t think we can stop the demons from being deployed. I don’t… i don’t know.” 

The three sat in silence for a while. 

Finally, it was Anathema who broke the silence. 

“We need to get to the root of the problem. Who is casting these spells, Essie?”

“My mother. Veranine is her name.”

Aziraphale began to catch on. “Where is she?”

“Hell.”

Aziraphale and Anathema exchanged a glance. “So… what?” Aziraphale said. “We go to Hell, we waltz up to this witch and we...  _ kill  _ her?”

He paused, looking confused. “Hang on,” he said. “She’s a human? How’s she in Hell? Is she dead?” 

Essie shrugged. “It’s some kind of powerful Satanic thing. She’s not dead, but she’s able to cross freely over the border between the planes. I don’t really understand it.”

“This spell you cast on Aziraphale, how’s it work?” asked Anathema. 

Essie took a breath to explain. “So an angel possesses a corporeal body, yeah? That angel, a non-corporeal being, has a tether to Heaven that allows it to cross over from the celestial plane to the earthly one. What the spell does is it severs that tie. 

“By taking the human body’s blood and mixing it with certain potent ingredients, it increases the strength of the body to assimilate the angel’s being, trapping it and cutting it off from Heaven. It corrodes the angel’s being, weakening it to the equivalent of a human soul. See, a human body, even if empty of a consciousness, contains fragments of the human will to survive. It’s not strong enough to overthrow an angelic possession, but with help…”

Aziraphale and Anathema pondered this in silence. 

Essie added, “A side effect of the preceding enchantment, which is cast upon selection of the angel to be turned, is an increased sense of free will and obedience to desires.”

Aziraphale blushed, although it was imperceptible to the two women. That certainly explained a bit.  
  
  



	17. Convergence

“You drive  _ fast!”  _ shouted Adam through a massive grin. Dog yipped in alarm from the back of the Bentley, wedged beneath the backseat and cowering in fear.

Crowley beamed in return. 

Soho is not far from Mayfair, and on a day with no traffic it would only take about five or so minutes to get to Aziraphale’s shop, but today there was lots of traffic, so it took even less.

Crowley had a knack for weaving in and out of the cars on the street, and the heavier the traffic, the faster he drove. 

_ Call me a speed demon,  _ he thought amusedly to himself.

“Brace yourself, kid,” he said, then hit the brakes in front of the bookshop.

He and Adam had talked. Crowley, at Adam’s urging, had shared what had happened with the demoness and with Aziraphale. He didn’t expect Adam to understand fully, and the boy didn’t, but they both agreed on what to do next:

Ask for forgiveness.

_ Unforgivable, that’s what I am. _

Unforgivable to Heaven, maybe. 

Unforgivable to his best friend? 

Different story.

Crowley knew that he had overreacted  _ severely _ . And, logically, he attributed it to his drunken state. But something just didn’t connect. He’d thought he’d lost Aziraphale before, and gotten pissed off his mind, but never had he done anything like  _ that.  _ It didn’t make any  _ sense... _

The Bentley’s tires squealed in protest as the car skidded to a halt. Adam’s body thumped against the dashboard, but he was kept in place by his seatbelt, meanwhile Dog crashed into the back of the passenger seat, scrambled himself upright, and yapped indignantly at Crowley.

The demon slipped out of the car, took a deep breath, steadied himself. Adam jumped out of the passenger side, landing neatly on the sidewalk. Dog clambered out after him.  

Crowley approached the door, and peered in the window. Then his blood ran cold.

“Adam, stay out here a minute, will you?” he said through clenched teeth.

* * *

“That  _ still  _ doesn’t explain what we’re going to do though, or how,” said Aziraphale. “We know how the spell works. We know what it does, and we know  _ who  _ casts it. You say this is a new enchantment?”

Essie nodded. “My mother’s been doing research for years. She finally figured out the right formula, and immediately brought it to Hell.”

Aziraphale looked at the ground, lost in thought. “We ought to prevent the demons being killed. If we allow that to happen, that sets off the war  _ for real.  _ What you’re saying is that the angels assigned to Earth are prepared for Hell’s emissaries, and will--” he cleared his throat “-- _ eliminate  _ them before the spell is ever cast?”

“Yeah. I think,” Essie thumped the heel of her boot against the floor. “I’m not sure, Gabriel didn’t tell me everything.”

Aziraphale’s eyes flashed at the name. “ _Gabriel,”_ he spat contemptuously. “I had a _feeling_ he was involved in this somewhere.”

Essie looked confused. “Well, yeah,” she said, “he  _ is  _ an Archangel.”

“You know what I me-- _ Crowley!”  _

Aziraphale’s gaze had fallen upon the shop’s front door, just as it exploded open and a massive black blur came through and flung itself at Essie. 

Essie took the full brunt of it, landing on the ground and looking up to find herself staring into the burning amber eyes of a  _ much  _ larger snake than she had seen previously. Its body coiled tightly around her throat, suffocating her.

She scrabbled at the scales with her nails, but it did nothing. She gasped and choked for air, legs kicking a few times in an effort to dislodge him.

_ “I expect this feelss familiar,”  _ hissed the snake venomously,  _ “only this time you’re on the receiving end, huh?” _

“Crowley! Get  _ off  _ her, I say!” cried Aziraphale. The demon ignored him. 

Essie’s face had turned an alarming shade of purple. Her piercing green eyes screwed shut, there was a blinding flash of light and a deafening bang, and Crowley flew away from her, smacking into a bookshelf and landing in a shimmering heap of scales. 

Aziraphale helped Essie up, who rubbed her neck as the power faded from her form. She was grinning.

“Not bad, serpent,” she said, a little hoarsely. 

Crowley coiled, appearing like he was going to attack again, then seemed to think better of it and instead stretched up and returned to his normal form. But not all the way, tho. He left patches of scales across his skin, a bit like the gold that adorned some angels’ faces, only more snakey.

His eyes stayed completely yellow, no white visible. They still blazed furiously. 

“What are you doing here?” he demanded. “Get  _ away  _ from him! Aziraphale, what--” He remembered the purpose for his visit, and the state in which he’d departed. His voice softened as he began, “Angel, I--”

Aziraphale silenced him with a look. 

The tension in the room was nearly unbearable, a palpable energy sizzling in the air between the three.

Anathema, who had been watching all this with a stunned expression, standing frozen in front of the sofa, offered meekly, “H-Hello, Crowley.”

He barely glanced in her direction. The corner of his mouth twitched in his acknowledgement of her. 

When Aziraphale finally spoke, his voice was flat, betraying no hint of any emotion whatsoever. “I think,” he said grayly, “that Adam should come in.”

Crowley, not taking his eyes off of Essie’s, called the boy’s name. 

He entered the shop cautiously, eyes widening at the scene before him: Aziraphale standing protectively between a tall woman with flaming orange hair and a fuming Crowley, who looked rather like a snarling wolf at the moment; and Anathema, still standing rigidly by the couch, terrified. 

“Now, all of you,” continued Aziraphale, “sit down. Now. We’ve a problem on our hands, and like it or not, we’ve got to work  _ together. _ ”       


	18. How It Should Have Went

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for the long wait! I got a bit distracted, and also started some other stuff. (...you can check it out... if you like... :D)

Crowley didn’t move. Adam went to stand by him, Dog following cautiously and giving Aziraphale and Essie a wide berth. The little hellhound didn’t much like angels. 

Aziraphale raised his eyebrows at Essie. She got his meaning and went to sit down on the sofa next to where Anathema stood. Anathema herself followed suit, lowering herself onto the cushions beside her. 

“If you think I’m going to listen to a single word that  _ whore  _ has to say, you are sorely mistaken,” hissed Crowley hotly, his eyes flashing dangerously. 

Essie grinned broadly at him.

Adam caught Aziraphale’s gaze. The boy’s eyes said, “He’s serious. There’s no way you’re gonna get him to listen to what she says, so you’re gonna have to tell him yourself.”

Aziraphale blinked, for a moment a bit confused as to how Adam’s eyes had communicated those words into his mind, then realized that he was right. There was no way Crowley would hear Essie out.

Aziraphale waded through the slog of tension that filled the room, grabbed Crowley by the elbow, and yanked him unceremoniously into the back room. The door slammed shut behind them.

Everyone watched silently. Then Anathema said quietly to Essie, “It’s a whole… thing with those two. I’m sure Aziraphale will get through to him.” 

Essie only glanced at her with a raised eyebrow in return. She turned her green gaze to Adam, fascinated. “You’re the Antichrist, then?”

Adam shrugged. “Sort of?”

The tension turned to awkwardness as Essie was at a loss for any response more substantial than a nod.

After a bit, Dog went over to sniff at a pile of books. As he did, there was a few thumps from the back room. 

“What was that?” asked Anathema.

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” replied Essie with a sly tone. “I think it just means that they got through to each other.”

* * *

“Angel--” Crowley protested as Aziraphale kicked the door shut with his heel. 

“Shut your mouth,” snapped Aziraphale shortly, stunning the demon into silence.  “Listen to me and listen  _ closely,  _ boy, because I am only going to say it once.”

He jerked at his bowtie pointedly, then without further ado marched purposefully up to Crowley, seized the lapels of his leather jacket, and shoved him roughly against the wall. He reflected that it was remarkably satisfying to switch places, and then did what Crowley  _ should _ have done during that so-called intimate moment in Tadfield Manor, what Aziraphale had  _ wanted  _ him to do, had even  _ expected  _ him to do, but they had been interrupted. 

Crowley just stood there for a few seconds, in danger of short circuiting again. Then he recovered himself, and returned it passionately. His eyes fell closed, and Aziraphale felt his hands grab his face and neck, pulling him in.

They would have stayed there like that for as long as they both needed, but quite frankly that might have been centuries, and there was little time to spare as it were. Aziraphale bowed his head, breaking away, and took Crowley’s hand from his face. Both were trembling a little. 

“Angel, I’m sorry,” whispered the demon.

Aziraphale looked up at him. “And I forgive you. Always, I forgive you. It wasn’t your fault.”

Crowley’s head snapped up. “What d’you mean, not my fault? She tempted me, I gave in! How’s it not my fault?”

Aziraphale gazed at him a moment, then led him by the hand to a sofa crammed in a corner of the back room. “I’m going to explain it to you,” he said. “This goes much deeper than you think. It seems we are going to have to stop Armageddon again.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also sorry that this one's kinda short, i promise the next one will be longer. More fluff to come!! ;))))) thank you for reading!!! love you all!!!


	19. A Confession

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sPiCy!!! :)))

Crowley, who had sat down, bolted up again.

“ _What?”_ He spluttered, gesturing wildly towards the door leading to the front of the shop. “But—Adam! He— _what?!?”_

Aziraphale held out his hands placatingly. “I know. I know. Yes, it’s rather difficult to understand. Please sit down, dear, and let me explain.”

Crowley blinked and, tentatively, came and lowered himself beside Aziraphale.

Aziraphale cleared his throat, wondering how to begin. _With the beginning,_ he supposed. “Alright. Firstly, I am afraid I must ask you not to call me ‘Angel’ any longer.” As he said it, an odd sensation wrenched at his heart.

Crowley wasn’t certain how to process this. “W-why not?” Then he remembered what had transpired earlier that day-- _that day?_

So far it was proving to be the longest day of his life.

“You--your wings--the demoness--?”

Aziraphale nodded gravely. “I am no longer an angel, i believe.” He scrutinized Crowley’s face for a reaction.

Crowley didn’t care if Aziraphale was an angel or not. It made no difference, so long as it was still his an-- still him in there. 

A thought prowled around the perimeter of his mind, rapping occasionally at the walls and making ominous noises, but the demon couldn’t place it. He decided he would figure it out later.

“How?”

_Here we go then,_ thought Aziraphale. “Right, erm. That brings me to the, er, second thing. You see, she’s not actually a demoness.”

Crowley said nothing.

“She’s--well, according to her anyway--not a demoness, but an angel. And not even that, but a-a half-angel.”

Crowley digested this with a scowl. “An’ what’s her other half? Human?”

Aziraphale made an “ehhhh” gesture. “Sort of? Her mother’s a witch. Essie says that she inherited powers from her mother, combined with angelic powers from her father. Who’s a demon,” he added helpfully, in case that was of any use to Crowley.

Crowley snort-laughed irritably. “Probably Asmodeus, the horny bugger. He’s always fond of getting it on with humans.”

“Oh.”

“So Essie bewitched you, then?” Crowley folded his arms, his expression unreadable.

Aziraphale shook his head. “Her mother did. You see, when Essie originally came, she stole the bandage from my arm--” he indicated the wound in his arm, which he had rebandaged himself after cleaning up the shop from the scuffle “--and apparently her mother used it to turn me human.” He waved a hand dismissively. “I don’t really understand much of what she said. Anathema seemed to grasp it though.”

“Why’s she here?” asked Crowley.

Aziraphale looked sheepish. “I, er, didn’t really know who else to call, erm, a-and I thought she could help…”

He dissolved into slightly awkward silence.

Crowley said nothing for a few moments, then prompted, “So, this end of the world business…”

“Yes, so the spell Essie’s mother cast… There are angels stationed on Earth, as I’m sure you’re aware. Hell is sending demons to do the same thing to them that Veranine--Essie’s mother--did to me. Or try to, anyway.”

 “So we stop them?”

Aziraphale nodded. “The thing is, though, Heaven knows about this. They--”

“This has got ‘Gabriel’ written all _over_ it,” hissed Crowley contemptuously, catching on. “I should’ve known. What, they’re going to kill the demons, use the attempt as an excuse for war again?”

“Yes, exactly. It appears they’re disregarding the Horsemen and all, and are going to try to have the war anyway. Although,” he said, repeating Essie’s words,  “it is technically a valid reason to go to war, we ought to stop it.”

“Agreed. But what about--” Crowley grimaced as he said her name, as though it was sour on his tongue “-- _Essie_? What’s her deal?”

“Ah. Erm, you see, she explained to me that when she did, ahem, the-the _thing,”_ said Aziraphale uncomfortably, “she was casting some sort of enchantment upon you, to… _incapacitate_ you. Said you would only get in the way. Erm. It was supposed to muddle your judgement, o-or something, I don’t really know…

“She meant no harm to you,” he added quickly. “She just needed you out of the way. See, she’s trying to stop the war from happening. She’s working for Heaven, or at least with them, I think. Or pretending to? She didn’t specify exactly who she works for, but she’s on our side.”

Crowley lowered his gaze. “Meant no harm, yeah?” His voice was the color of a starless night. 

“What? Did something happen?”

Crowley shook his head, his eyes still fixed on the floor.

 Aziraphale didn’t buy it for an instant. He reached out and gingerly took the demon’s hand. “Tell me,” he said softly.

“Nuh, ‘s nothing… just got a bit… messed up is all. I almost--” He broke off, biting his lower lip. He looked up at Aziraphale; his eyes were filled with something dark and deep. 

Crowley thought about telling Aziraphale about the venom. About almost giving up. He felt Aziraphale should know, but at the same time, should he _really_? Crowley was alright now, after all. More or less. Adam had shown him se--

_Adam._ Adam had sensed the venom, hadn’t he? He’d taken it out of him, he’d cleared his head, hadn’t he? 

“Crowley? Are you alright?”

“Adam…” whispered Crowley in awe. _When he took my arm, he didn’t just stop me from discorporating myself. He_ took away the venom _!!_  

“Pardon?” Aziraphale stared at Crowley worriedly.

“Adam showed up at my flat,” said Crowley, meeting Aziraphale’s eyes. “He fixed it, he countered Essie’s spell somehow, he made me see reason. He saved my bloody _life,_ he did. 

“Ang-- Aziraphale, I had given up. I thought--I thought I’d lost you for good this time, and I thought there was no point in staying on Earth, because the whole reason I’d ever _come_ here in the first place was ‘cause of you.”

Crowley drew a sharp breath. “They didn’t tell me to go up there, to the Garden, I _asked_ them to. I remembered you, from-from Heaven.” He paused, not sure how to continue. Actually, he _did_ know how to continue. “Look, it doesn’t really matter what I nearly did, I’m sure you can put it together. The point is…” He faltered, looking helpless.

“It’s alright.” Aziraphale said it gently, evenly, but beneath it he was quietly freaking out. What had he _done_ to the poor demon? How could he have been so blind to Crowley’s emotions? 

“The point is that I love you.”

There. He’d said it. 

The silence that followed the last word seemed to solidify the air around them. Crowley waited for the inevitable rejection of verbal confirmation of his feelings. Sure they had kissed. Sure they had shown that the other meant the world to them. But saying it…

It was different.

_You go too fast for me… I don’t think my side would like that very much… There is no “our side…”_

Aziraphale opened his mouth a few times, and each time gave a tiny shake of his head before closing it again. 

_Here it comes…_ Crowley braced himself for it, tried to wave his confession away with a hand, tried to shrug it off while searching for words to fix the situation and, finding none, looked at the ground desperately wishing he had sunglasses to hide behind.

Aziraphale slowly reached out a hand to cup Crowley’s face. “I love you too.”

And he leaned forward to kiss him again.

Crowley half-stood and tripped over his own feet, dragging Aziraphale with him, and flapped his hands while looking for something to grab onto. He smacked the sofa a few times with a series of loud thumps, but ultimately landed on the ground with Aziraphale on top of him.

Both of them were fine with that.

Crowley put his hands around Aziraphale’s neck and waist, pulling him closer. Somehow their lips were still locked together, and each felt the other’s tongue as they made out passionately. 

It tasted sweeter than the first time.

They began to move. Aziraphale had just taken a handful of Crowley’s shirt and was in the process of unbuttoning it when there was a knock at the door.

“Are you two alright in there?” called Anathema’s voice. 

Aziraphale hastily scrambled off of Crowley and started attempting to tame his now-tousled soft floof of white hair. “Yes, everything is perfectly fine,” he called. “I trust that you will work with her,” he said to Crowley about Essie.

Crowley climbed to his feet. He rubbed the back of his neck, then spotted something on the floor and stooped to pick it up.

“Oh, alright,” he sighed, putting on the sunglasses. “Let’s get on with the bloody thing.” He gave Aziraphale a soft smile, and pushed open the door.

  



	20. Revelations, Part Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ajsdklf i knowwww i said i was gonna upload soon but school happened and my teachers are quite keen on ensuring i barely have time to breath in between assignments, plus i just can't get the words to flow right :/ But hopefully i'll be back to a regular upload schedule soon, or at least it won't be like three weeks between updates

Essie watched as Anathema returned to the front of the shop, followed by Aziraphale and Crowley. The two walked close to each other, their arms brushing. Evidently she had been correct in assuming things had gone well. 

“We’re cool, demon?” she said expectantly. 

Crowley looked at her. “Yeah,” he replied, a trifle warily. 

“Right, so everything is fine, we’re all caught up?” asked Anathema, reclaiming her spot next to Essie on the sofa. 

“ _ I’m  _ not,” piped up Adam indignantly. “Nobody told  _ me  _ anything.”

Everyone in the room stared at him in silence for a moment. 

“Adam, you’re the Antichrist,” said Aziraphale pointedly.

The boy looked thoughtful. “Oh yeah,” he mumbled, a bit sheepishly. 

Another short pause followed. Then Crowley asked quietly, “So what do we do?”

Everyone looked to Essie. She was staring silently at the floor. Upon noticing the attention, she flicked her gaze up. 

“Yeah, there’s a thing I didn’t mention,” she said. “I don’t work for Heaven. Or Hell. And neither does my mother.” She paused as though to say more, then didn’t. 

Aziraphale blinked. “Would you mind elaborating a bit?”

“She has her own agenda,” Essie began. “She wants to start the war up again.”

“Yeah, we know,” said Crowley testily. Then he thought over what she’d just said. “Wait, what d‘you mean, ‘her own agenda?’”

“She wants Heaven and Hell to obliterate each other,” interjected Adam. “She wants nothin’ t’be left, nothin’ but Earth.”

Essie nodded. “Exactly. Okay, how to explain… So basically she wants to protect the Earth. She hates Heaven and Hell more than anyone. She hates them because they’re always ‘messin’ about’ with Humanity. She just wants them— _ us— _ to be left alone.” As she said the word “us,” she gave Crowley and Aziraphale a look as if to say “yeah, us supernaturals too.” The three of them had chosen their side—they were  _ human.  _ Neither here nor there. 

Color splashed on a world of monochrome. 

“But _why_ though? It just doesn’t make any _sense,”_ said Anathema. “If the war starts up again, it’ll destroy Earth, won’t it?” 

“ _ Yes!! THANK YOU!!!!!!”  _ cried Essie, throwing her hands up. “I’ve  _ told  _ her that, and she says she’s got a plan, but i don’t think she really  _ understands  _ it.”

Aziraphale blinked, then said slowly, “How much time have we got? You said that Hell is preparing to dispatch the first wave. We need to stop that from happening.”

“I don’t know exactly how long we have. But it’s safe to say not much.”

“What you’re saying is that Veranine believes that she is doing the  _ right  _ thing. That makes her very, very dangerous,” pointed out Crowley. “So we need to convince her that what she’s doing is wrong?”

Essie shook her head. “That’s not going to happen.”

“Well we have to do  _ something!”  _ Crowley hissed, growing more agitated by the minute. “How is this even  _ our  _ bloody problem  _ anyway?  _ All I ask, all I’ve ever wanted is just to live in  _ peace!”  _ He concluded this outburst with a huffy little snort and smoldered behind his sunglasses. 

Essie regarded him coolly with her eyes narrowed slightly. “If you want to live here, then it is very much your problem.”

Crowley snorted, folding his arms and looking away.

“Well, anyway, something  _ must  _ be done. And soon,” said Aziraphale, hyperaware of the tension. 

“This is the third time we’ve established this, we  _ know  _ we have to do something,” sighed Essie, pushing her hand through her hair. 

“We could expose Veranine…” suggested Crowley, still glaring sullenly at a bookshelf as if it had done him some deep and personal wrong. 

“Yes but it may not make any  _ difference,”  _ Aziraphale countered. “One way or another, they  _ want  _ the war. They won’t care.”

Anathema spoke up from the couch. “We could warn Hell,” she said quietly. 

“Didn’t you hear him??” Crowley looked to be on the verge of breaking beneath the stress of the situation. “They aren’t going to care—”

“Shut up!”

Everyone turned in unison to stare at Adam, who was on his feet and looking upset. “You grown-ups, you just stand around debating what to do and bickering among y’selves, an’ nothin’ ever gets done! This is why they wanted me to end the worl’ in the first place, this is!”

There was stunned silence, except for a yip and a low growl from Dog. 

“And you’re forgetting something.” Adam pointed at Aziraphale. “ _ He’s  _ mortal now, and I can’t fix it. So if you all try to get into Heaven or Hell, he’ll die.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Btw this is probably gonna be the last few chapters, and after that i'm gonna need a new series to write on our ineffable idiots, so if you have an idea, feel free to drop an ask on my tumblr! @skatle-skootle-demon-noodle  
> love you guys!!!! <3


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